Boys Just Wanna Have Guns

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This ad was in the December 1966 'Boys Life' magazine. Of course. What an ideal Christmas gift!

TBT: Bound for Texas via Mississippi

I have not scanned photos or slides in many a day. It's not a process I enjoy so I can always find something else to occupy myself. However, I do try to make some effort on Thursdays to deal with my abundance of images. I really wish that my dh would scan another photo album for me!

These two slides were ones taken after my first marriage in April 1966.  Had we not divorced it would have been 51 years this year. Amazing... After a honeymoon in Quebec we drove back to Maryland and set off for his next duty station in the wilds of Texas. While my father had driven us to Florida in 1955 for a Christmas trip, we never had those long cross country trips that many other families did in the 50s. So my sight of the Mississippi River was a big deal to me and I managed this shot. Apparently it was the first shot on a roll of slide film and thus the yellow on one side.

Coming down from the north through Tennessee, I know we crossed at Memphis which I do not remember at all. I suspect we may have arrived at this point at night and just moved on in the morning.  In any case, I did ask my husband to let me take the next photo. Mississippi brought mental images of the horrors of the Civil Rights Movement to my mind. Murders, bombings and the power of the KKKlan were more representative of Mississippi than magnolias in 1966. I was really glad to get though that state and on to Texas.

TBT: That Winter of 1966

As we hear ifs and maybes about upcoming snow, I'm looking at images of a snowfall back in 1966. My husband and I drove up from our new home in San Angelo TX to the Washington DC suburbs that had been our childhood homes.  It was a Christmas time visit that only the young would attempt. On the day shown in these photos we decided to drive to the new town of Reston. Prior to the Beltway opening in 1964, this would have been a long and tedious drive. However, in 1966 the drive was quick and enjoyable. Try to say that today!

My then husband surveys the surroundings. I don't think he was as impressed by Reston as I was but then I had a friend who worked for the Rouse company, another big developer. New towns had caught my interest and gave me options to the dreaded suburbs of my childhood.

Our good friend Robert drove us in his ancient...Volvo? Saab?

I was pretty sure I was pregnant at this time, having had one miscarriage already. We wanted a baby born while my husband was still in the Air Force so the baby would be 'free'.  Driving back to Texas, I was sure as I had my first waves of serious nausea which was a shock to both of us.  So many things you don't know when it's your first child til you experience them. Morning sickness was only a phrase til my body explained it to me!

Whether we get snow or not this weekend, I know for sure I won't be driving to Reston, though a trip to the Leesburg outlets could be tempting...

Travel With Me Tuesday: Sonora Texas 1966

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Not a great photo but seemingly the only one that survived this day trip from San Angelo. When we had free time we wandered as far as we could go and get back the same day. The size of Texas was a revalation to us, used to the smaller East Coast states. Hoping to have a baby before we left Texas, we also knew that our days of total freedom were coming to an end. Did we actually go into the caverns? I suspect so but as we had both been to the ones in Luray VA, I can't be sure that we did.

I do remember that I looked at these covered wagons and doubted that I would have been the one to agree to Go West back in the pioneer days. But that is looking at these choices with 21st century eyes.

TBT: That Texas Wedding - 50 years Ago

This is the rest of the photos from our friends' wedding down in San Angelo Texas. Carl and Janet became the third couple of the group, back from their Air Force assignment in Turkey, to be married. The majority of the men were still single so we marrieds spent a lot of time together...eating dinner, playing cards and just learning what it was like to be married.

From left to right..unknown, Vince McCarron, Kelly Meadows, unknown, Tom Houlihan. Vince and Kelly are still alive but I wonder about the others in this photo. This was the Vietnam era...

TBT: Texas 1966

This lad, my former husband, here relaxing just before a wedding down in San Angelo Texas, just had a birthday this week. Birthday boy is now 72. Time does pass, doesn't it. Funnily enough, I now have yellow chairs just like those in the photo.  I bought mine on Craigs List a couple of years ago because they really appealed to me. Now I see why. Yellow metal chairs mean a happy time and I didn't even realize it til today!

Flashback Friday

1966..a quaint custom back then to show off the marketable women. Children were always anxious to catch the bouquet and look at the woman in the orange dress. She was a workmate of mine who was past the usual young marrying age. Perhaps in her late 30s? The 20yr olds were ready to spring but I only remember my workmate as seriously eager.

How times have changed.