Happy St. Valentine's Day to All

 

RH and Dewena

1960

Celebrating Our Wedding Anniversary

Could I just have one more moondance
      with you, my love?

 

Anniversary Thoughts

Happy Anniversary, Mama!

And to Daddy, in heaven!

Even though they eventually settled in Nashville after World War II, Mama and Daddy weren't really big fans of hillbilly music, as country music was called then.

Mainly, they were products of the Big Band era. Glen Miller and Tommy Dorsey were to them as Elvis and the Beatles were to RH and me as young marrieds.

Mama knew the words to all the big band songs and sang them as she worked about the house in our new two bedroom, one bath home we moved to when I was four, not long before my little sister Deb was born.

I remember being in my pajamas one night staying up later than Deb, a baby in her crib. It was before we got our first television set but the radio was on, the one Mama listened to Stella Dallas and other soaps while ironing.

Music was playing, what I now know was swing music, and Mama and Daddy were dancing, to what I now know was the Jitterbug.

Mama was in a housedress and Daddy in casual slacks and a short sleeve button down shirt that he changed into from his suit after work each day.

Both were in their sock feet and they were having the best time dancing while I watched from the sofa. Daddy wasn't throwing Mama over his shoulder or anything fancy like that but darn if they weren't pretty good, I realize now. 

Mama's shoulder length black hair was bouncing and Daddy had his tongue stuck out through the corner of his mouth like he always did when he was concentrating.

When I remember this night of dancing, I realize that they were still in their early 20s and young, oh so young. 

And fun, lots of fun. This photograph taken while Mama and I were with him in Arcadia, Florida for his Primary Flying gives a hint to that.

We three are on the left, with their friends on the right, Air Force buddies and Christmas card friends all their lives.

I have so many wonderful memories of my childhood but this one, the night that my parents danced in the living room, is tops.

It was a grand night and I was their audience, at least until I was tucked into bed.

Happy Anniversary, Mama and Daddy!

P.S. Since Christine asked in the comments about that being wigs on our heads in the photograph or not, I thought I'd better clarify that it was Spanish moss from the live oak trees. Evidently it was abundant around the Homestead, Florida area where Daddy was stationed, but let's just hope there weren't bugs in it!

Waiting

On Friday the 13th of October, 1961,

my father caught me in his camera lens, reflected in a mirror,

standing in the doorway of our dining room.

I was waiting to get dressed for my wedding.

***

For a week now I have been without internet,

no way to blog or visit my blog friends,

visit with family on FB, email, pay bills......

Having a weak signal on Monday, I am trying to post this,

hoping it will get published. 

After 3 visits from Comcast, 

one which did restore our television reception,

we are promised a tech and bucket truck on Tuesday

to run a new drop line.

Tuesday October 13th, our 54th anniversary.

And so I'm waiting again, waiting to blog again,

and visit my dear blog friends.

I hope you will wait for me,

because I will be back.

But today, R.H. and I will just celebrate 54 years of marriage,
while waiting for the cable guy. 

Added October 14th at 3:18 p.m.:

After 9 days our internet is fully restored!

I just published these wonderful comments--thank you so much for your

anniversary wishes! I'll begin returning visits this evening. I can't wait to

see what you've all been up to!

Dewena 

A Marriage and Violets

In late April I think of the columns Clara Hieronymus used to write in The Tennessean newspaper. Not her theater columns from her 40 years as theater critic for the newspaper but the annual columns about her wedding anniversary and her April garden.

The newspaper photo above is from my diary as I could not find it online. Her bridal coronet is made of Confederate violets, and violets were always her leitmotif in the columns.

Here are some excerpts from her columns that I saved in my diaries, along with pictures of the Confederate violets that grow in our own garden among the purple ones. 

Mrs. Hieronymus taught me to love them.

"As if to urge a more familiar mood of festivity, our violets are in bloom, in the garden borders and all over the yard--long-stemmed Confederate violets whose woodland find supplied the flowers for my wedding veil, rich purples from a friend's garden years back, whites and pale lavenders, and bright yellows that speak of my husband's fondness for yellow flowers."

"It makes me happy to recall the morning I opened my eyes and saw my young husband standing by my hospital bed. Our first child had just been born and my husband had bought all the violets the florist had, bringing the purple bouquets to me in both hands."

",,,55 years of companionship with a man who has been patient and loving and appreciative of April's metaphorical bounty of violets, year after year."

"We met our problems in these 56 years with hearts as resolute as we could make them…we grew together in increasing sympathy and loving understanding of each other's strengths and weaknesses."

"With violets and grape hyacinths making the yard a blue and green mosaic of flowers and grass, we greet another year."

Each year, year after year, I read Mrs. Hieronymus's columns, inspired by their marriage and yes, envying their marriage. They didn't quite make it to their 58 year anniversary as her husband passed away the month before their next anniversary. 

That year Mrs. Hieronymus wrote:

"In the midst of grief I reach for solace, and find comfort in the fact that he was here to see one of the most beautiful springtimes in the 45 years we have lived in Nashville.

"The violets that he knew I loved bloomed in a joyous abandon of purple, yellow, white and blue in the borders and grass everywhere.

"We loved this garden, his Christmas gift to me one year…A haven where we might savor coffee and the morning paper, or visit over a glass of wine on a summer evening, listening to the whispery rustle of the cane and growing quiet as a hummingbird visited the red salvia.

"We walked together in this paradigm of beauty for the last time.

We said goodnight to each other that evening.

We did not know it was also goodbye.

"I am grateful for 58 years of a husband's warm and undemanding love. My heart hurts. My eyes fill. But I think I hear him saying,

"It's all right honey.

Don't cry.

Look, the violets are blooming."

Companionship. Sharing a love of family, home and garden. Isn't their's a beautiful story?

Clara Hieronymus died November 30, 2013 at 100 years of age.

[source of this photograph]

Love At First Sight

My grandfather met my grandmother at music class.

She was the teacher, he the student.

It was love at first sight for him.

She took a little wooing before saying yes.

They were married until death did they part.

Added on February 4th: 

I've just returned from visiting Nancy at Created for a Journey. Nancy is the latest guest writer at Jemma's Passion, Purpose and Productivity Project. It is clear to me that Nancy not only knows what her purpose is but is comfortable with it and excited about it. Please visit her and see for yourself. And her latest passion, photography, beautifully illustrates the other passions in her life. 

It has been such fun being a part of this project. To review, the other bloggers taking part in this have been:

Jemma of At Home with Jemma, our hostess

Honora of Pondside

Linda of Sew What

My own post as part of this project is at this link.

A Happy Wife

Peter, Peter pumpkin eater,

Had a wife but couldn't keep her;

He put her in a pumpkin shell

And there he kept her very well.

One of the biggest treats of the year for me is a visit to the Farmers' Market in October. My sisters and I grew up making regular trips to the Market with our father who was a produce buyer for the Kroger stores here. He knew all the growers and spoke their language, having grown up on a farm himself.

R.H. knows that I'd rather have pumpkins than diamonds. Here's the back of our car at home before he unloaded all our pumpkins…

Now for the fun of finding just the right places for them at Valley View.

Smart Peter knew what he was doing when he put his wife in a pumpkin shell!

Sunday Morning Breakfast

Just a simple Sunday morning breakfast…

With the sports section for him….

to celebrate our Tennessee Titans' 

win last night over the Green Bay Packers.

Yes, it was only a pre-season game,

but a nice start for the new coach.

And the Portfolio section for me…

As a Super Fan of Johnny Cash

I have to read about the restoration 

of his childhood Arkansas home

while I eat my breakfast dessert of

one homemade buttermilk biscuit

and some Sour Cherry Jam. 

Getting ahead of myself though,

first there's BLT's on Publix's

5-Grain Italian Bread.

Simply because R.H. stopped by 

the Farmer on the Hill,

as we call our local neighbor who 

sells the best homegrown tomatoes 

in a roadside stand.

These tomatoes just beg to be made

into BLTs, so we do.

Our heavenly Father,

we thank you for our many blessings…

And I'm thankful for a husband who doesn't fuss

when at the last minute his wife says,

"Grab the camera, R.H., this table is

too pretty not to photograph."

And he, grateful that this is one table that

hasn't required hours of planning and staging,

does just that, even thought the bacon 

cools off a little bit.

It was a good Sunday morning breakfast.

The Enchanted April

"To Those who Appreciate Wistaria and Sunshine.

Small mediaeval Italian Castle on the shores of the

          Mediterranean to be Let Furnished 

                      for the month of April.

                  Necessary servants remain.

                                     Z., Box 1000, The Times."

via

And thus did Mrs. Wilkins and Mrs. Arbuthnot reply to the above advertisement and rent San Salvatore for the month of April, escaping their miserable lives in London. Along with a Mrs. Fisher and Lady Caroline Dester they awoke one April morning in Paradise.

via

"Such beauty; and she there to see it.

Such beauty; and she alive to feel it.

Her face was bathed in light.

Lovely scents came up to the window and caressed her.

A tiny breeze gently lifted her hair…

How beautiful.

Not to have died before this…

to have been allowed to see, breathe, feel this."

from The Enchanted April

by Elizabeth von Armin

My 1924 copy of The Enchanted April reads: "By the Author of "Elizabeth and Her German Garden." Now we know that both books, and others, were written by Elizabeth von Armin. 

via

I reread this book every April and watch the gorgeous movie. Perhaps it should be required reading for all engaged couples and at every wedding anniversary.

Mrs. Wilkins' husband, Mellersh, "a solicitor, encouraged thrift, except that branch of it which got into his food. He did not call that thrift, he called it bad housekeeping." 

When Mrs. Wilkins' and Mrs. Arbuthnot's husbands arrived at San Salvatore, Mr. Wilkins was impressed that his Lotty had made the acquaintance of wealthy Lady Caroline.

via

Mellersh is played by one of my favorite actors, Alfred Molina:

Lotty Wilkins is played by Josie Lawrence, who unlike Lotty is obviously noticed at parties:

via

Mrs. Wilkins is "the kind of person who is not noticed at parties. Her clothes, infested by thrift, made her practically invisible. Her face was non-arresting; her conversation was reluctant, she was shy."

Rose Arbuthnot is played by Miranda Richardson:

via

Mrs. Arbuthnot's husband Frederick is played by the incomparable Jim Broadbent:

via

"Frederick had been the kind of husband whose wife betakes herself early to the feet of God."

via

Clearly, Frederick has been besotted with Lady Caroline. Rose is, by all accounts, a neglected wife. But at San Salvatore the madonna-like beauty of Rose attracts Mr. Briggs, their landlord.

Mr. Briggs is played by Michael Kitchen, the star of "Foyle's War":

via

He finds something in Rose Arbuthnot that Mr. Arbuthnot has not seen.

via

"…the more Mr. Briggs thought Rose charming the more charming she became."

via

Rose became quite captivating, as husband Frederick soon realized.

via

And there is reluctant femme fatale Lady Caroline, played by beautiful Polly Walker:

via

Lady Caroline is at San Salvatore to be left alone, or so she thinks, to sleep, not to be called upon to give orders to the servants in her fluent Italian. 

"I haven't come here to housekeep, and I won't."

She was tired of her mother telling her what to do, tired of men grasping at her, tired of silly women being jealous of her.

"She didn't want their tiresome men."

via

And then there is autocratic Mrs. Fisher, played by indomitable Dame Joan Plowright:

via

Plowright, once married to Laurence Olivier, plays the role of Mrs. Fisher with all the determination in those dark brown eyes that appear almost black. Stubborn, proud, insistent on her own way, but Lotty Wilkins senses her vulnerability.

via

Lotty "sees" Mrs. Fisher's hidden needs, Lady Caroline's, Mr. Briggs', the Arbuthnots'. She even finally sees her husband Mellersh's, because she believes the best of everyone. 

San Salvatore causes her to "see" it all, in the magic of "The Enchanted April."

"The View from Mrs. Wilkins's Bedroom

After a Water-Colour by the Hon. Lady Mallet"