~ September 19th ~ is a wonderful day for me as I remember my parents ~
This would have been my parents
57th wedding anniversary…
My parents spent 38 wonderful years
together
Both passed in their 66th years seven years apart.
Both from cancer of differing types ~ Dad due to
melanoma
Mom from lung cancer.
I miss them both ever so much…
A photo collage at our Big Home ~ Mom and Dad’s wedding portrait along with a smaller round snapshot centered in the middle. On this hallway wall, I’ve displayed our wedding portrait {upper left} along with a card I gave Charles long ago {lower left} as well as my father’s parents’ wedding portrait.
But, I didn’t come here to cry
or
to make you cry,
I came to share a love story…
🙂
Gene and Ginny met while working
at a small coffee shop
in Boston, Massachusetts
while both were attending college.
Dad was in between services
with the
United States Army {enlisted, 1950’s}
and the
United States Air Force {as an officer}.
He was going to the University of Massachusetts studying
a double major in Business and I want to say Law,
but I’m not really sure about the second.
Gene had spent three years with the Army
down in Panama
traveling and performing with the
Army band there ~
playing the piano and french horn.
He moonlighted playing in a jazz band on
Saturday nights at a club there ~ eventually
being offered
a job with Lester Lanin
and his band and orchestra.
Gene didn’t take the position, though,
instead signing up with the Air Force,
becoming a JAG ~
short for Judge Advocate General ~
in other words: a solicitor, a lawyer.
Gene and Ginny married in September of 1959.
They married during the golden era of Hollywood
around the time when Grace Kelly married Prince Rainier of Monaco
and
Jacqueline Bouvier married the future President John F. Kennedy
when they were the toast of the nation.
My mother was tall and lithe ~ she looked beautiful in
high school photos in her yearbooks
wearing the proverbial 1950’s skirts and
Peter Pan~collared button~up shirts with a
cashmere sweater over top.
When she and my father went out
she was stunningly beautiful in
the evening gowns she wore, and
her hair was stylishly short like Jackie Kennedy’s.
She was studying English
at Boston College
and
played on BC’s basketball team
{something I found out years later}.
Later onshe switched majors to Special Education
after my deaf brother was born.
Their first posting with the United States Air Force
was to Ohio, my home state.
My deaf brother Frank and I were born
there in Ohio. On a side note the rubella vaccine was brand new back then and I was vaccinated and so was Mom however babies in-vitro couldn’t be so that is how Frank became deaf as a result of rubella floating around from neighbors who unfortunately had the disease.
And happily we love Frank just as he is! 🙂
I used the Canon to photograph this Polaroid I took when I was about 11 ~ our second house on Oahu, Hawaii. My three brothers ~ Frank, Gene and Tom ~ about 1972. I shared in my last post about these Koala Bears.
Many other wonderful places came thereafter:
Colorado {where my brother Gene was born},
Massachusetts {where my youngest brother Tom was born},
then four fantastic beach~filled years in Hawaii
and finally
moving to sunny California
where my father retired after 20 years
of military service.
My parents were best friends who loved opera and listening to Boston Pops performances on t.v. specials in the late 1970s and through the 80’s. The Mikado, Gilbert and Sullivan records, and many other operas and musicals were the stuff my brothers and I grew up listening to every weekend. My father and mother performed in a number of plays together when we lived in Hawaii and Dad was always a lead character in one play or another all the way up until his passing.
They had a shared love of watching football basketball and hockey on t.v. The San Francisco 49ers were their favorite football team though they were happy to watch any football game.
Sometimes, Dad would play his rendition of the Happy Birthday song for Mom and us kids whenever it was our birthdays. His arthritis was bad so he rarely played piano anymore as he got older so it was a treat when he would play. I was always in awe of his ability to read so many notes on a page of sheet music at one time!
Frank standing out front of Mom and Dad’s home as it was in 2008 or so.
Connecticut was their final home place and they found a home with 12 acres and a pond. Every February they held a skating party inviting friends and family serving New England clam chowder or Daddy’s famous spaghetti and meatballs made with cooked chicken and Scottish banger sausages to the hungry crowd.
A view through the kitchen window screen down to the half~acre pond.
Their plan on Dad’s retirement was to sell this home buy a motorhome coach and travel down to Tennessee and the Carolinas looking for a retirement home and visiting my aunt and uncle on Hilton Head as well as traveling the country. This was not to be… {Funny, as now we are living that life… more or less.} 😉 All good Love stories must come to an end but Love never really ends does it? I’d love itif you’d share your parents’ love story or your own or a family member’s love story with me and with the others who read this little ole blog! Please leave a comment and tell us your story. Blessings to you on this lovely warm Sunday morning, 🙂
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French Ethereal is a lifestyle blog sharing tips on decorating, table settings, crafts, gardening, DIY and travel. I love an elegant Shabby Chic/Old World French decor all decorated with Faith. <3
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1 thought on “Jouyeaux Anniversaire ~ A Love Story”
1 thought on “Jouyeaux Anniversaire ~ A Love Story”