‘My short first marriage, in short. Sort of.’

I’ve written about my first marriage before. Specifically, about how I (finally) revealed to The Child the fact that I’d had a Husband Before Daddy. It’s a pretty funny story. Now. Though it was pretty traumatic for the poor Child at the time.

It’s weird to think that your mom had a life before you existed–that she locked her brother in the pantry and tricked her father into letting her go to the drive-in and smoked in the car (just one time, but still) to provoke her mother–much less that she was actually legally wed to Another Person Not Your Parent.

Me, after having been wed to a Person Other Than The Child’s Parent. In my extremely hot, extremely (in retrospect) inappropriate-for-August-in-Southern-Illinois gown

And even though my first marriage lasted only a very short time–I’ve had cars longer than I had that husband–it was still a Real Marriage. There was a Real Wedding, complete with rehearsal (see the top of this post for a photo of us practicing our vows with Pastor Kahre), in my hometown church. With six friends and relations as bridesmaids in homemade-but-pretty dresses, and a reception with a tiered cake and boozeless-but-punchy punch. So I think this marriage deserves, at the very least, its own blog piece.

Me, as a Real Bride. Gulping that punch (it was HOT). Don’t think I had even a bite of that cake, though

First, a bit about The Guy. I did tell you, in “My Polio-Shot Marriage”, that he was a fraternity guy (as opposed to my Other Serious College BF, who was a tie-dyed in the wool hippie). His was the frat (Sigma Alpha Epsilon) whose members had a penchant for dressing in Confederate Uniforms on occasion–occasions more formal than those requiring nylons and wrist corsages, which were football games.

I met The Guy when I was on a blind date (yes, blind dates “work”; in fact, that’s how I met The Dude)–but the blind date in question was with a totally different person whom I left in the lurch when I spotted The Guy across a room crowded with Boone’s-Farm-swilling collegiates.

The Guy caught my attention with his good looks and charm, but he also had a great story. He came from a town even smaller than mine deep in the Missouri Ozarks. His Dad, whom I never met, was a long-haul trucker who ran off with a truckstop waitress. His Stepdad (I never met him, either) was a merchant seaman based out of Galveston. His Mom wore muumuus and those fold-up slippers with jewels on them and ran a beauty parlor out of the back bedroom in their house, which stood on cement blocks and had a couch on the porch.

(I have a vivid recollection from our first Thanksgiving: eating turkey dinner off TV trays while watching Dolly Parton on the Porter Wagoner Show in his Mom’s living room, where his Gramma was ensconced on a cot. None of this fazed me, except for the fact that they put cornbread in their stuffing.)

We even had real cans tied to the back of our getaway Vega

Not only did The Guy’s life sound like a country western song, he could actually sing country western songs. He played the guitar and had a really nice voice. We would sing “Me and Bobby McGee” and Linda Ronstadt songs together (my voice is simply awful; he must have loved me) as well as such gems as “Put Your Sweet Lips a Little Closer to the Phone” and “Hello Country Bumpkin, fresh as frost out on the pumpkin.” Which is, scout’s honor, a real song.

The Guy and Me, blissfully wed. Yes, those were the days of more facial hair and fewer foundation garments

This was a guy who not only made it to college — the first in his family to do so — but was the president of his fraternity and, when I met him, wrapping up his last year of law school. He was also great with kids. (He took my little sister and even littler brother on boat rides.) And nice to animals. (We took in a particularly problematic treated-the-shag-carpet-like-a-litter-box stray cat in our first year of wedlock.) And did I mention he had a great sense of humor? (The Guy is my source for gems like “He was so dumb, his brain rattles around in his head like a bee bee in a boxcar”) He could even cook. He made a mean chicken casserole with canned mushroom soup.

Great story. Great guy. So what happened? Trust me, this is the very question my parents asked when I called them to deliver the news that we were breaking up. (Mine was the first divorce on either side of my family. This was devastating news.)

To this day, I don’t have a real answer. I don’t think it helped matters that the ink wasn’t even dry on our marriage license when The Guy had to report for military duty in Indianapolis. (He went to college on an ROTC scholarship, so he “owed” the Army.)

The Guy and I, about six months’ married, attending somebody else’s wedding — my Aunt Marilyn’s, in fact. (Domestic skills note: I made that dress)

So for months, I was a married college senior, living in a dorm. (“Heck, we’d paid for that dorm contract!” my parents and The Guy agreed.) So that was weird. And then, when The Guy came back, we had completely different schedules and hardly saw one another. I was up late–and out, at the library–studying, while he was up early to go to work. And even though our apartment was rather Barefoot-in-the-Park adorable, the Murphy bed completely blocked the door, making it impossible to go our separate ways without waking–and annoying–each other.

So. Anyway. Speaking of going our separate ways, that’s ultimately what we did, even though I can’t really explain why. I honestly have no idea what path The Guy took (we had no kids, and no real reason to stay in touch, so we didn’t). But, as you know, I ended up moving to New York and meeting The Dude and having The Child. Who knows where I’d be if I’d stayed married that first time? I could go on and on about Fate, and about Paths Not Taken. But I won’t. Instead, I’ll show you this picture taken in my going-away dress. And then I’ll go away. Until next week, that is.

Me, with my Mom, Grampa Henry, and Uncle Mark, looking impossibly young and hopeful, getting ready to ride off into the sunset in that Vega

Amagansett, New York. August 2018