D DAY, THE SIXTH OF……NOVEMBER?

The year 1964 was an exciting and eventful one for Americans.

The year before our country had lost its president, John F. Kennedy, to an assassin’s bullet (or bullets) and he had been succeeded by Lyndon Baines Johnson, who was still missing a ballot box from his first election to Congress from the Perdenales River Valley of Texas.

The Vietnam War was escalating, with the White House calling the shots, and missing the target most of the time. Folks back home watched the commentators on nightly newscasts and pronounced Walter Cronkite as the most trusted man in the country.

And in the little town of Chattahoochee the fourth grade of the school was assigned a task. Each child was to bring a topic that was of world significance.

The next morning the teacher learned from one student that Red China had exploded an atomic device. From another it was apparent that the greatest news was the escalating war in the Far East. But there was one child that seemed hesitant. It was apparent that she was uncertain that she understood the assignment. Then her face lit up. “I know, I know! Homer Hirt, Jr. is getting married!”

So there it was: the almost thirty-five year old Navy man, who drove a 1957 Thunderbird and avoided commitment to the opposite sex as firmly as George Washington had railed against “entangling foreign alliances” in his Farewell Address to the Nation, was about to become a wedded husband.

I had met Theresa in the office of the Ford Motor Credit Company in Tallahassee, and we dated for some time. I even sold her a new 1965 Ford, just as my father had sold my mother a Model T. The difference was that he had to teach her how to drive the automobile.

Since it was Leap Year, Theresa proposed to me. She proposed a total of three times, though in later years she said it was only once, but who was counting? The date was set for the sixth day of November, hence the title of “D Day”. We both referred to our anniversary that way, with a little humor tempered by fact. We were married in the Presbyterian Church in Quincy by the Methodist pastor from Chattahoochee. Seated in the expectant audience, which was a near full house, were at least two of the other women that I had dated. Thankfully they kept quiet through the “Speak now” part.

We settled in to a marriage of compromises. Since I was active in several organizations, even President of Rotary, she would attend appropriate events with me. I would often be called on to speak, and what better humor with which to leaven the speech than newlywed jokes. On the way home one night she said: “Holmes, I will offer you a deal. You will never have to go shopping with me if I never have to attend another meeting where you are allowed to speak”. I quickly accepted, and this held for forty-two years.

There should have been one other agreement.

Theresa was an Elvis Presley fan. No, a correction here. She was the ultimate fan. As a young single woman she had been to his concerts. She owned 45’s, 33’s, eight tracks and cassettes of his music. She had an Elvis decanter filled with bourbon and ash trays that she dared anyone to use. Post cards, books and movie tapes completed the collection. I had watched Elvis once, and that was on the Ed Sullivan show, when Ed filmed him only from the waist up. I would have preferred that he filmed him from the waist down, so that I would not have had to look at his famous upturned lip that drove the women wild.

For forty two years I had to listen to “Long Legged Girl”, “That’s All Right” and “Blue Moon of Kentucky”. I was forbidden to step on his “Blue Suede Shoes” or to answer the question “Are You Lonesome Tonight”. I was assured that I was “Nothing but a Hound Dog”. Elvis asked, nay, begged “Let Me Be Your Teddy Bear”, and then sung “Don’t be Cruel”, as if being called a hound dog was not cruelty enough to get the Partners for Pets down on me.

But I persevered. I did not step on any “Blue Suede Shoes” or have any “Blue Christmas” celebrations.

I have decided though, that I cannot go through this again.

If and when I take my children’s suggestion that I acquire a person to take care of my home, or if the lure of a live-in becomes too strong, the questionnaire that I will use to select the candidate, immediately after the query “Do you mind wearing a French maid costume from Frederick’s of Hollywood”, will ask “do you care for Elvis Presley?”. If the answer to this is “yes”, she will be rejected for cause, with no appeal.

After all, I really do not believe that I can tolerate another four decades of Elvis!