And We Continue

I never dated anyone that I went to school with, no one ever asked me out, so I went to school and work and then home. My family formed a singing group, I played piano and sang alto, Wayne sang bass, Juanita sang soprano, and Mamma sang tenor.  Judy was small and sometimes we would let her stand on a chair and sing too. We were the "Northey Family". Daddy did not sing, but he loved for us to do it and he enjoyed hearing us and everybody else. We would go to several different Churches where they would have singings. I don't remember if we went on Friday or Saturday night. sometimes we went on Sunday afternoons too. Sweetwater Baptist is where we went to Church and we had singings there too.

I think I must have met a boy named, Max Bush at one of those singings, I don't know how else I would have met him as he lived in Sanford, between Opp and Andalusia. We did start dating, but I don't remember him going to singings with me. Doesn't matter, I guess. We dated pretty often, going to the movies, but most of the time we parked somewhere and kissed. A lot!!! Boy, he could kiss!!! But that is all we did. One time we were parked, I think Exie and some boy was in the car with us, a policeman came up and told us to move on. We did, as we were a little shook up by that!! Did I tell you he could KISS?!? Well, I know I knew how after that.

Then one Saturday night that summer between my Junior and Senior year in High School, at Sweetwater Baptist Church, we were having a singing. Ann Donaldson from Kinston was there and we took turns playing the piano for the congregational singing in between specials. I don't know how many special groups were there, but we, the Northey Family was one of them.  There was a boy there from Lowery, named L.G, Weeks. He was dating Ann at the time. I guess I was still dating Max, but he was not there that night, don't know that he ever went to the singings.

Anyway, when L. G. got home he told his Mom and Dad he was going to marry that girl with the gold teeth.
Well, I think it was the next day (Sunday) that he came and took me and Juanita (I think) and probably his brother Emmitt, and we went to Sasser Crossroads to some Baptist Church for a singing. Well, from then on  we were a couple. He did not have a phone so we wrote letters during the week and saw each other on the weekend. Of course the letters would come the next week, but we still stayed in contact as much as possible under the circumstances. I still worked for Dr. Burgess, full time in the summer and he had a job with the state working on highways.

Well we decided that we belonged together and we went to a lot of movies at the drive-in, but we also spent a lot of time in the living room "courting and kissing!" with Mamma and Daddy and every body gone to bed. But we had a certain time for him to go home.  On Thanksgiving of that year, he brought me an engagement ring. We were proud as peacocks!!! We told everybody that we wanted to get married when I finished school. We set the date for June of 1954, put an announcement in the Opp News and everything.

Than along about March, L.G. decided he did not want to wait any longer and said if I did not get Mamma and Daddy to sign for us to marry then, he was going to go to South America!!! Well, naive as I was and am, I believed him. How I thought he was going to afford it never crossed my mind, so we told Mamma and Daddy we would run away if they wouldn't sign. So they finally agreed.................and the saga continues next time.......