In January, 1985, I got a call from the assignment people; the same ones I called to get to California, only this time they wanted to move me. They said I had been at Ft Ord for awhile, and asked if I was interested in transferring somewhere else. This was their way of saying, “If you want to move somewhere we can try to work it out, but one way or another, you’re moving.” So I mentioned the southeast. He asked me define what I had in mind and I told him anywhere south of the Ohio River and east of the Mississippi River. The following week I got orders to Charleston AFB, SC, reporting in June 1985.
This news had an impact on my relationship with Sue. I had gotten to the point that I thought at some point we might get married, but neither of us were rushing in that direction. I called Sue and gave her the news and while she sounded a little apprehensive about it, she didn’t say anything. Over the next week or so I thought hard about whether to let things stay the same or propose. I finally decided that it seemed inevitable at some point, so why not do the deed.
I spoke with Douglas about it also, since to me, he had veto power over it. If there was anything he wasn’t comfortable with I wouldn’t propose, but he said he had no objection. So I did and Sue prompted rebuffed me with “I’ll think about it.” Think about it? We were running out of time. Not only would we have to plan a wedding but I would have to have time to amend my orders to include her and Michael, and the military didn’t do anything quickly.
She finally said yes, so that was the biggest step out of the way. Next, it was off to the personnel office to let them know and they promptly put me in touch with the chapel. It was mandatory to get premarital counseling, which included the chaplain. This was so the non-military person would know what rights and services they had in the military and have a better idea of what to expect.
We went to see a protestant chaplain, a Baptist one to be specific, and he viewed it as no big deal since Sue and I had “been around awhile”, as he put it. We were to have 3 or 4 meetings with him before he performed the wedding. During our second meeting, he mentioned kids. Sue and I were both around 30 so we didn’t believe kids were likely and therefore not an issue. But the chaplain was concerned, and said since I was Baptist and Sue was Catholic we should decide right then and there how we would raise any new kids. I told him to me it wasn’t even a consideration, and he dropped it, but mentioned it several more times over the course of the counseling.
Then on Tuesday, before we were to be married on Saturday, he called me at work and said he was sorry, but he had just realized he would be out of town over the weekend. That was the closest I’ve ever come to calling a man of God a liar. I will always believe the he was balking just because I wouldn’t commit to raising the kids as Baptists.
Anyway, I immediately called Sue and she almost fainted. We had three days to come up with another minister. One of the ladies Sue worked with said she her grandfather was a retired Pentecostal preacher and she would ask him. He agreed without question. He was a very nice man. Very cordial and understanding of anything we wanted to do. However, he did have a little Parkinson’s and tended to forget sometimes.
On Saturday, when we arrived at the chapel, everything was ready. Douglas was my best man, Amy was the flower girl and Michael was the ring bearer. Just before the wedding the minister came over to where Douglas and I were standing and said that he was going back to see Sue, and when we saw him walking back to the altar, that would be out queue to walk out and wait for her to process in. In the meantime, when he went to see Sue, he told her to take her time, there was no rush, and he headed back toward the altar. Well, Douglas and I saw him coming back toward the altar, so we marched out to the head of the aisle to wait for Sue – who was in the back, taking her time.
After several minutes the guests were watching Douglas and I and started to murmur, wondering what was going on. So was I, but at this point I didn’t know whether to go back to where I was or just stand there. Finally, she came walking up the aisle, but by that time I was nervous as I could be. She took my arm, we walked up the steps and stood in front of the minister, and then I noticed he was having a major Parkinson’s day and was shaking so hard it was a wonder he could read it. I felt both sorry for him and impressed by him that he was brave enough to stand in front of people in that condition; a condition that wasn’t helping me at all, because the more I watched him shake, the more nervous I became. I didn’t faint, but we did rush through things a little bit.
It was a lot to go through in such a relatively short time, but we made it, and I have to say it was meant to be since we’ve been together since. At our reception, I met one of Sue’s friends, a lady from Peru (I think) who made her living as a fortune teller. A few months before I met Sue she had gone with her aunt to visit this lady and on a whim decided to get her fortune told too. She had told Sue that she would meet a guy who wore a blue suit with real shiny shoes and have something to do with the air, and that we would get married and go to a place where the trees were different and have a long happy life together. She was right.
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