Saturday, February 15, 2020

Saturday Night Genealogy Fun - A Memorable Valentine's Day!

It's Saturday Night - 

time for more Genealogy Fun! 


Valentine's Day was yesterday, 14 February...

Your mission, should you decide to accept it (cue the Mission Impossible music here) is to:


1) Recall a memory of a Valentine's Day in your life. Is it the first love of your life? A special day with your lover, spouse or significant other? Do you have a picture of a Valentine's Day event, or a special Valentine that you received, to share?


2) Describe your Valentine's Day memory, activity and/or image in a blog post of your own, a comment to this blog post, or in a comment/post on Facebook.


3) Have fun remembering a special day.

Here's mine:



Here's a picture of my really special Valentine taken almost 50 years ago on her wedding day:



Yep, it's a 1968 Ford Mustang - we loved that car! It's outside our first apartment in Chula Vista. She's about to jump in it and go get ready for her walk down the aisle.


Linda had all of five weeks to plan and execute a wedding - and she managed it extremely well. I was so happy to see that she had project management skills in addition to all of her other talents.


Back up five weeks and what day is it? Yep - it's Valentine's Day. Here's the story of that day:


Flash back to 14 February 1970 - it's a Saturday night. I'd been dating Linda seriously for about six months and we know that we are "in love." We've had a lot of fun, met each other's families, talked about the future, what we want from a marriage, and know each other pretty well.

We were invited to a Valentine's Day party at Linda's cousin's house in Ocean Beach. I'd met them before, and Sue's husband, Bill, is a funny and raunchy guy - as I thought I was. We go, and meet many of their friends, and I'm introduced as "Linda's good friend, Randy." One of the ladies (Sue's age then - maybe 40ish) corners me and says "How good a friend are you?" giving me a wink and raised eyebrow.

Without a blink, I blurt out "well, I'm proposing to her tonight, but don't tell anybody!" She says "Don't worry, I'll keep your secret" and gave me knowing glances the rest of the night. After we leave the party, she went to Sue and said "Guess what Randy told me" and tells Sue the secret (there's a lesson learned here, eh?).

We didn't go directly home, as I still have to fortify my courage a bit more. We stopped at our favorite bar, King Luis Inn, for a drink and some bar singing (we loved doing this while dating). None of the regulars were there, so I couldn't blurt out the secret to them. I had talked to my Catholic priest friend, Father Jack, who was visiting San Diego, and had suggested that we meet at the bar, so he was there when we get there. When Linda went to the ladies room, I told Father Jack my secret.

Now well fortified and well committed, I carefully drove us to Linda's apartment and we had an appropriate amorous interlude. It was time to exchange Valentine's Day cards and gifts, and I only had a card. She opened my card and inside I had written "Will you be my Valentine ... forever?" She looked at me, now down on my knees, and says "does this mean your proposing to me" and I said "Will you marry me?"

Of course, another appropriate amorous interlude occurred, and I went to my apartment an hour later. We went to the church on Sunday (after about 3 hours sleep!) and talked to the pastor, and asked him if he would marry us on 21 March 1970. He said he would, and we set off on the whirlwind five weeks of preparation and planning, that culminated in a 7-day honeymoon in Acapulco, but that's another story.

So Mr. Romantic did a pretty good job of finding an excellent woman to marry, and after 49 years we're still in love and living amicably together. It hasn't been much of a struggle. Life has been good for us with health, work, children, friends, church, hobbies, vacations, retirement, and grandchildren. We look forward to spending our 49th anniversary quietly in Chula Vista and, hopefully, making more family history in the year ahead!  I'm wondering what we will do for our 50th anniversary next year.  

We still laugh about, and appreciate, 14 February 1970.  I made a superb choice and an excellent decision.  

==============================================


Copyright (c) 2020, Randall J. Seaver

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6 comments:

Lisa S. Gorrell said...

No memories of sweethearts, but memories of Valentine's Day at school.

https://mytrailsintothepast.blogspot.com/2020/02/saturday-night-genealogy-fun-memorable.html

Linda Stufflebean said...

Here's my link - https://emptybranchesonthefamilytree.com/2020/02/saturday-night-genealogy-fun-79/

It's a Small World said...

Congratulations, Linda and Randy, on your 50th anniversary coming up. Randy, we met at the SCGS 2005 Jamboree and I don't expect you to remember, lol!!!

Randy Seaver said...

Hey there, Unknown,

I met no people at SCGS 2005, because I didn't go to 2005, I started going in 2008. Perhpas it was another year after 2008?

My memory is full of unknown faces now. And names. You left me no clues as to your name and face. Would you mind emailing me to let me know who you are? randy.seaver@gmail.com

Thanks for the trip down memory lane here...

It's a Small World said...

Oops, it should have said, "2015". Sorry Randy :( Will write a long email to you later this week explaining our meeting and a little bit of our similar life and personality.

Linda Stufflebean said...

Congratulations on your upcoming golden anniversary. I love your Valentine memory.