Senior Year 1963/1964 (in chapters)

Chapter 31

Our senior year was unlike any of our other years and, as with the others, I'm not sure how to approach it. There are no major problems, a few rather humorous events, and a steady awareness that our wedding was getting closer day by day. The wedding was the elephant in the kitchen. Much too big to be ignored, but we still had to do our college work, and live each day as it came along.

One of my very best friends, Merle, had returned to Valpo after a three year absence. I guess I haven't mentioned him, but he was one of the reasons, maybe the main reason, I picked Valpo. He was a year order than I, and went to Valpo the 1959-1960 year as a freshman. I visited him three times I think, and he sold me on the place. After I'd been accepted he told me he wasn't coming back, both because the work was too hard and because he didn't have the money. I guess if it hadn't have been for Merle I never would have met Marilyn. Anyhow, in 1963 he decided to come back and try again.

I started this whole project last May and I never dreamed it would take on a life of its own. Nor did I expect the size, or the scope to be what they have become. Further, it has been more emotionally draining than I ever dreamed it could be. Still, I wouldn't have missed the experience for the world.

Now I'm still not sure I've yet met my original goals of finding out how and why Marilyn and I met, courted, and married, but I have learned a lot of other things, so the trade off is a good one. With still a year to go I'm looking forward to what I may yet discover. Then, when I finally get to our wedding day, I'll take a long look back and see just what I've done.

I already have made a serious rewrite of the first year and I'm starting my revision on our second year. (That's a much bigger job) Further, I don't like the way the third summer was presented, too much a letter by letter approach so I know I'll be revising that. Then I think I'll see if it has the legs to be published. (I can dream can't I?)

At any rate, even if no one ever reads it all I'm still glad I did it. I gave Marilyn copies of the first two years over a month ago. I think she is a little afraid to read what I've written, since she hasn't even started them yet. I'm sending her sister a copy of the first two years tomorrow.

One hundred essays. I never expected that. I suppose if I'd been asked at the beginning last April I'd have said maybe 25 or 30. However it didn't take me long to know it would be many more. In fact, I still intend that Marilyn have her input. She can tell me and I'll write it, or she can write it herself. I'm also going to pick Lloyd's brain, and Maxine's and even Merle's if I can find him.

Let's get started. I don't remember a lot about Marilyn's visit to do her September Teaching Experience other than the incident at school the first day when she ran into Rachel. Oh, she also met Miss Murray, my high school Spanish teacher. They had a talk about me. Miss Murray had gone out of her way to help me pass high school Spanish ands I never thanked her. Thank you Katherine.

In fact, Marilyn met most of my old teachers. She hadn't ever experienced a school like mine. Her graduating class was almost 50% larger than my whole school. (900 in her class, 550 in my school.) We all knew everyone in our class and many in the other classes. Marilyn knew her circle of friends but that seems to be about it, (If we ignore that she could make new friends quite easily.)

Anyway, for three days she went to school and I went roofing. At night we sat in that recliner and talked, and in fact we did talk. We both knew my grades had to be better this year than they had ever been before. I had 111 hours and only 102 grade points. There had to be at least 128 hours and the same number of grade points, I needed to make up nine points and I still had a semester of Spanish to take. As a point of comparison, Marilyn had 110 hours and 217 grade points.

Still, being together again, and knowing there wouldn't be another summer apart, we looked forward to our senior year. As it played out, there were only a few little bumps. The year went well.

Just a quick overview. We spent a lot of time together, at least as much as any other year. We continued to go to athletic events, we played bridge often, we bowled, played pool, watched TV, and of course, we studied. The biggest change I suppose was that we were both 21 so we could legally buy a drink. Also with Merle there we often double dated. Merle acquired a girl friend shortly after school started and they stayed together most of the year. Her name was Dee.

I'll talk about a couple of those double dates in more detail later. To be honest, I think I tried to arrange double dates as a protective devise. I was, for some reason I can't remember now, determined to wait until we were married to make love to Marilyn. However, she had already said we could if I wanted to. Talk about being at war with yourself. But sometimes I could be what my mother called, "stubborn as a Dutchman." A phrase her mother used about her father (My grandfather). This was such a time. I was not going to do it. Double dating helped keep the temptation level down.

I have fond memories of that autumn of 1963. Not a lot of specifics, but a general sense that things were progressing as they should. I remember the first two months as golden. We were together, we were going to be married in a few months, and I seemed to have a handle on all of my classes except Spanish.

I learned a couple new things about Marilyn that fall. For one thing, she gets drunk quite quickly. Two drinks are about her limit. In that respect she is very much her mother's daughter. Her mother had no tolerance at all for alcohol, and on a couple occasions got tipsy drinking straight orange juice she though had vodka in it. Marilyn wasn't that bad, but we learned early on that she wasn't much for an evening of drinking. As an aside, I had a pretty good ability to absorb alcohol. Maybe the summer before had done it. I have to work at it to get drunk, and I seldom have done that, other than in the summer of 1962.

A brief sidebar - Marilyn got better at drinking when we both acquired a taste for wine. It could be sipped slowly and savored. It's been our drink of choice for about the last 35 years. End of sidebar.

I guess the most sharply remembered event of the fall was November 22, 1963, the day President Kennedy was killed. We were just finishing lunch in the Student Union when the loud speakers announced that the president had been shot. I remember a small crowd of people, students, and professors and staff standing under one of the speakers, just staring at it as the announcement was repeated.

We both had classes and as I drove us to the old campus we heard a radio announcer, I think it was Paul Harvey, say, "The President of the United States --- is Dead." We didn't talk until we got to the parking lot.

Not knowing what else to do we both went to class. I had a Spanish test that day and the Spanish professor came in crying. She handed out the tests and left. (Sidebar- Valpo worked on the Honor System. Professors never stayed in the classroom when the class had a test. End of sidebar.) Several students left right behind her. I looked at the test for maybe five minutes, then signed my name to it and put it on the professor's desk. Most of the rest of the class, when they saw what I had done, did the same thing. The professor gave the test again the next week, and apologized for handing it out the first time.

I met Marilyn as I walked back to the car. Her professor had canceled class after ten minutes. We sat in the car and listened to the radio for over an hour. Then Marilyn said, "Take me to the dorm, I need to cry, and I don't want to do it here."

Just as we got to her dorm the campus campanile started tolling. It struck once a minute until JFK was buried. I remember lying in bed at night listening to that tolling bell. It was strange when it stopped. We were again in the Student Union eating lunch and suddenly people began to look up and scan the room. It was maybe two minutes before someone said, "It's stopped." We all knew what "It" was.

Of course we didn't know it then, but the world we had grown up in had just changed forever. I think that's ponderous enough for now.