Virgie Bell's View: Drapes and Drama

One time my little band of friends got together and I suppose we had nothing much to do and as we were discussing this we decided: "let's do a wedding". This was between our junior and senior year. There was a movie at the time that featured an elaborate formal wedding and we definitely liked how glamorous it all looked. We were this little bunch of best friends and as daring as one could be at that time. To be honest no one was very daring. Daring was not a very popular thing back then at old Amherst High School. Mostly it was in fact giving Ms. Weddle a hard time during Home-Economics. It wasn't even a very hard time at that. Bobby Joe, a boy in our class got hold of her notebook where she had taken notes on us disrupting the class: Joy...talking out of turn...Joyce...disrupting class by going to the bathroom without permission. That sort of mean and evil action...Jo Ann...refusing to complete assignment on drapes for Home Ec. cottage....Virgie...talking out of turn, going to the bathroom without permission, failing to complete assignment on drapes for the Home-Ec. cottage.

Really daring as you can see.

At any rate, Joann was already married to my cousin and was living in California at the time. We had room mothers during high school; they were always the same ones. It was a given that it was mine, Barry's, Joy's, Joyce's, and the list had included Joann's mom right up until she ran away to marry and was no longer in our class.

We could talk any old time, go to the bathroom on a whim, and let some other class finish the drapes that we came to hate anyway. In other words, they let us do pretty much what we wanted when we wanted. This was really just about it and was harmless looking back on it now. Oh, there was a time that one girl called me a name that rhymed with witch when I was a freshman and I had a fight with her. This was of course discussed by all of us and I had to talk to mother and daddy and get a feel as to what this would entail in my home life as far as giving up privileges. Mother told me no dice or she would ground me for a week, Daddy threatened me with a few weeks and so the die was cast. It was probably the most exciting event to happen at our school for a long time. Well, Joy's Dad was on the school board and she looked into just what would happen if this grand event took place. Come to find out, as long as it was off the school grounds it was not going to be within the school’s jurisdiction to do anything, and so the event took place down on the lot behind what is now Artie Jewel’s Dry Goods Store. I was to wear my jeans as were all the rest involved. I wasn't too concerned about who would win this cat fight. I was younger than Mickey who was 18 months older and older than Bennie by 18 months and had been fighting with and against them all my life. An old hand at this you see. The girl I had to fight was an only child as I remember and so therefore not much of a challenge that I could see. But then this was way in the past and things had gone quite stale for us and so we decided to plan a wedding. I could have had a dozen fights by this time, but they didn't materialize, and for that I was thankful. They would have whipped me all over the place and I wasn't going to push my luck on that score. But back to the wedding.

Well, I was chosen to be the bride. I was thankful for the lead in this drama. I had the lead in the Junior Play and relished being the main character. The movie had featured pictue hats and off the shoulder dresses for the bridesmaids and a little number that I thought would do for my starring role. It was decided by each of them that pastel colors were the thing that was the fashion for such a thing and of course, White for the Bride. I really felt that the costumes they had were by far the cutest and we tossed the idea around that maybe someone else could have the lead and I could be a bridesmaid. But no. They knew their parents would never go for it and for a while it seemed that the event of the summer just might be cancelled.

Mom and Dad were separated at the time and mother was so used to me performing that she kind of got into the role of mother of the lead role and so it was on. I think it was Joyce who decided that a June wedding was the required month for a wedding. She, more than the rest of us, was more up on that kind of etiquette than the rest of us were. So the rest of the summer was taken up with the fun things of deciding on the costumes. It was an elaborate affair for that day and time. To choose patterns and to have bridal showers and picking out music and singers and piano players and churches for the ceremony was as much fun as I had ever had. Picking out crystal that has never been used to this day was a plus. Every choice was of course, a group decision, and it wasn't hard to come up with what the male cast to this event was to wear. Blue suede shoes were all the rage. So were blue suits for the guys.

Actually it wasn't much fun on that choice. Men clothes have never been much fun. We didn't have a place to shop for a tux within a hundred miles it seems. Oh, I’m sure if we had tried, we would have found something a little more formal, but we considered the guys to have very minor roles in this production. I had pretty much settled down on the groom department for quite a while by now. Harvey and I had set a record by going together for my entire junior year. Just because I didn't like to sew on drapes for home Ec. didn't mean I didn't know how to sew and so I got to design my elaborate trousseau. I think Joyce was the one to tell me that this was a custom for brides and I relished the idea.

When the Junior Play was over, I went home just the same old girl as always and things went on in my life as usual. I think that I loved the idea of a Honeymoon, but it never occurred to me that my life would change for good. That as a married woman I would no longer have my mom do the cooking and the washing. It never was even in the discussion. When I was gathering up my clothes to become a Mrs. instead of a Miss, my mom wanted to know if I wanted to take these old ratty house shoes that I dearly loved. I was horrified at the idea that she even entertained the thought. With everything new and pretty, who wanted those old ugly things? I guess I was married for about two weeks when the reality of the situation set in. We had gone to visit my family in Fieldton and I decided the play was over. Harvey was much younger than his sister who was married and had a child and lived off some where. He lived out in the country and to be honest, I missed the brothers and sister that I had grown up with. It was so quiet and lonely being a wife. He spent the day in the field. We had no telephone, and no TV. The most excitement I had was when my mother taught me to sort clothes and how to wash at the steam laundry in town.

At this visit with my family, I knelt down by my mother’s chair and with tears in my eyes, I clung to her. Harvey stood by the door a little embarrassed. He liked the honeymoon part much more than I did. Finally, Mother told me that I needed to go, that my husband was waiting for me. Well, I went into my old bedroom and grabbed those awful looking house shoes and glared at that old honeymoon loving man and said, “Alright let's go!”

Well, the wedding was absolutely a thing of beauty. I finished my senior year as a married woman with I am sure was because of a little power behind Joy's dad being on the school board, and best of all, Mother made my drapes. SUPPORT THE TROOPS!

PS. Joy, please send this to Joyce. I don't have her e-mail address handy