6

Alabama - Mrs. Blanchard, Professional Mother 6

"When our goodhyes were said, my mother cried, and implored Mr.
Fenton to be good to her little Cissie. My father embraced me in
silence. But my brother, with the casual frankness of the seventeen
year old boy, whispered, as he gave me a farewell kiss...'Take care of
yourself, Cissie. Papa says you've made a terrible mistake.'

"Perhaps I have! The thought stabbed me with a premonition of
disaster as Mr. Fenton assisted me into the cab, and slammed the door
upon a shower of rice, and a babel of goodbyes and good wishes.

"Learn to look out for yourself, Cissie,' my father called from
where he was standing on the porch steps. 'and don't forget the old
folks at home.'

"Though his words caused me to break - for an instant into tears
and to vow I would think of them every moment of the time we were apart,
I am ashamed to say, that I literally forgot their existence during the
ensuing days with Mr. Fenton in Oklahoma City,

"For in something old and something new, something borrowed and
something blue, I had married the man who most completely represented
the ideal of which all young girls foolishly dream, and hundreds of miles
away from those I knew and loved, I was embarking upcn the most stupendous
adventure in a woman's life.

"Having entered whole-heartedly into the esperience of home-making,
our little apartment, with its green and yellow carpet; its golden-oak
furniture and ruffled lace curtains at the windows, seemed to me, the
most beautiful spot in the world. I know now that it wasn't much. But
I thought that it was perfect; just as I thought Mr. Fenton was perfect.

"I suppose all brides who are very much in love at the time they
are married, go through that stage when the King can do no wrong. It's
all a part of life I believe, and except for this period of bedazzlement,
a lot of marriages wouldn't last long enough for the ink to dry out on
the marriage certificate.