We get a call a few days later from our salesman that there
is a problem with the paperwork. The
lien holder had kicked it back because my name is on the top of the deal, I am
not official GM family, and not authorized to use the certificate. We have committed a little bit of fraud. We have two choices: bring the truck back and
try to redo the deal, or get married immediately. We decide to get married.
On February 5, 2004 Jay and I are legal married by the local
Justice of the Peace, in my Momma’s living room in Keatchie. I wear a simple white shirt, black skirt and
no shoes. My mother freaks and keeps
yelling at me to put my shoes back on. Oy
Vey! It is just my parents, Jay and I and
Paige. It all happened so fast that Jay
forgot to invite his parents. My father
gives me away by kissing me on the forehead.
Something he used to do when I was little and sick and he was trying to
check my temperature. It’s just our little thing.
As I start to say my vows I become overwhelmed. My father is standing behind me, I almost
faint on him. He pushes me with two
fingers, ‘cause he is a very big man, and says, “Don’t make me get the Shotgun!” What??
I regain my composure. We had
never practiced our vows. When I said
them for the first time, I wanted them to mean something. I place my hand over Jay’s heart, swearing on
it when I take my vows. I say all the
vows, but I refuse to say that I will obey him.
I believe no one should have to blindly obey anyone. It should be a choice.
There is an old saying that when you marry someone you marry
their whole family, and that is very true.
A wonderful husband with a bad family can be a new bride’s worst
enemy. I know many women who have a lot
of trouble with their in-laws. I am
blessed that Jay has a wonderful family.
That is one of the reasons I agreed to marry him.
I’ve often said that when I married Jay I not only got a
husband, but I got a grandmother too.
There is another old saying that men marry their mothers. While I love my mother in law, and she has
never been anything but nice to me, we are very different people. We are cut from different cloth, me and
her. She loves to shop. I hate to shop. She loves shoes and purses. I despise shoes and spend most of my life
barefooted. At the time I could count my
shoes and purses on my hands. I have
since become a bit more girly. My mother
in law is very much a city girl. Nothing
wrong with that, it’s just different.
She is by no means a Novelle! She
and I are both steadfast in our resolve that we love and what whatever is best
for Jay.
Knowing Jay’s mother, and how different we are, I often
wondered why he would choose to fall in love with a very country girl like
me. When I met Momma Muriel, Jay’s
paternal grandmother, I knew why. The
first time I met her she told me a dirty joke.
“Hey! You know how to
kiss a ducks ass?” she said
“No.” I said
She then blew, as if to blow the feathers away, and made a
kissing noise, “But you got to be quick!”
We both exploded in laughter! She from the joke and me from the fact that
this woman of 76 has just said the word ASS.
Novelle would never have done that!
Oh I liked her already. Momma
Muriel and I became fast friends. We
were both country girls and cut from the same cloth you could say. She’s spent more the 40 years as a nurse and
had seen it all. She was fierce and
independent, despite being confined to a scooter most of the time. She still drove and did all her own
errands.
Momma Muriel lived in an old trailer on 22 acre just north
of town. Her land was full of very tall
old pine trees, beautiful Bartlett pear trees, thick woods and a creek. I feel in love with this place the first time
I saw it. Years later she would ask us
to move out here to care for her and in her will she gave it to us as her last
gift. The more I feel in love with this
little piece of land, the more I knew I wanted to be married here, in the
spring when the Bartlett pears bloomed with their beautiful white flowers.
I had spent months sewing and weaving clothes for our Ojibwa
wedding. For Jay I made a cream colored
drop sleeve shirt. While not period, it
looked nice. I wove him a belt on an Inkle
loom. He wore his brown canvas pants and
a black beaded choker that he had made for himself long ago.
My regalia had taken months to construct and research. I had made for myself a purple drawstring
skirt, a full length white apron with ribbon embellishment, an embroidered
pocket, a handkerchief with a tatted edge, a blue tribal style shirt circa the
1700’s with ribbon embellishment, and a double sided shawl with fringe, in our
wedding colors of purple and teal. Jay
made a leather sheath form me to carry my dear antler handled knife in. We beaded the bottom and added tinkle
cones. We designed the sheath to hang on
the string of my pocket. Jay also made
me a beaded choker, and Maddie gave me a cow tooth to hang from it. I wore my hair in braids. I also wore a ring given to me by the Caddo
tribe years before and earrings made by a Caddo – Adais lady. My maid of honor,
Mary, had made me a leather head band, with eagle plumes that Jerry had given
me. In my hands I carried a bouquet of
feathers that Mary had also made for me.
Both of these things were her wedding gifts to me.
While I might have looked silly and stupid or disrespectful
to some people, I felt beautiful. I felt
I was doing something very true to my heart and my soul. It was always our intention to be as
respectful as we could to a culture we felt such a connection to.
In attendance were Momma Muriel, my parents, Mary and her
husband, Jerry and his wife. Jay’s
parents refused to attend. Prince,
Pumpkin, and Precious looked on at us from the pen. I had hoped to have them in one of the ceremonies,
but having them watch and protect us during this time was the best I could do.
At sunset Jay built us a sacred fire. We gathered close to it with Jerry and his
wife. She wrapped us in a blanket that
Momma Muriel had crocheted many years before.
Jerry brought out a small little bowl to bless the fire with. Inside was cedar from the tree under which
his grandmother was born. We were all
shocked to find out that she and I had the same birthday. To it we added our gift of tobacco. Jerry gave me the bowl as a wedding
present. It sits on my altar to this
day.
At some point Jerry tied our hands together and we took our
vows to each other. I think I was crying
a lot, ‘cause I don’t remember as much as I should. Jerry spoke many words to us. He told us of marriage and to keep our minds
and our bodies clean. He told us we were
married in this life and the next and we could never divorce. We like to joke around our house, that the
only man who could undo our marriage is Jerry, and he is long since dead. We are stuck with each other, whether we like
it or not. Finally Jerry brought out an
eagle wing and blessed us with it. That
was the most magical moment for me. To
me this was my wedding. If you ask me
when my anniversary is I will give you this date. To me everything
else was just for show. There was no
reception. We just all went out later
and ate fried catfish, Momma Muriel’s favorite.
The next day on March 20th, 2004, at 2 o’clock in
the afternoon, at Keatchie United Methodist Church, Jay and I were married,
again. We were married in the same
church my parents had been married in 22 years before. Our invitations were simple and printed on
parchment paper, in color from our home computer. They were sealed with a silver wax stamp of
two intertwined hearts, our little symbol.
We hand delivered invitations to those we could and mailed the rest to
those we could not. We had about 30 or
40 people in attendance.
The wedding was very simple and informal. I wore a white chapel length dress with a
v-neck and short sleeves. I was hesitant
about wearing white, because I had been married before. Etiquette says that a bride marrying for the
second time should wear cream. When I
told this to Jay he said, “You wear white for me baby.” I loved that, and so I did. My hair was piled high on my head with
ringlets. I wore a wreath of flower and
ribbons in my hair and carried beautiful silk flowers with ribbons.
Mary, made all the flowers as her gift to me. She made all the corsages, flower for the
bridesmaids and stood as my Maid of Honor.
Maddie and Paige were my bridesmaids.
Instead of buying stupid dresses for the ladies to wear, that were
ridiculously expensive and they would never wear again. I asked that they all
wear something purple, something that they would wear again. They did and they all looked lovely.
Jay wore a white shirt and black pants. His grandfather was his Best Man and his
friend Robert was his Groomsman. All of
our friends and family were there, yes even Novelle.
As my Dad walked me down the aisle, I stopped to light a
candle in front of a picture of Oma. We
were married by a pastor who’s name I don’t even remember, and I am not sure I
had even met before. By this time we
were kind of old hats at this.
For less than a hundred dollars we rented the Keatchie town
hall and held our reception there. We
had a lovely Italian cream cake, with double hearts on it, green sherbet punch,
and finger sandwiches. We had decided on
an afternoon wedding, because we didn’t have the money to feed everyone. It was a nice way for everyone to have a
break in their day, and still have time to go home and mow their lawn. We had our little toast and cut the cake for
our friends and family to enjoy. As Jay
does not dance and we have never had a special song, until recently, there was
no dancing. We opened gifts, thanked
everyone for coming and went home.
Jay and I were too poor for such a thing as a
honeymoon. We would not take that until
years later. We just changed clothes,
loaded up our dogs, got in our car and headed back home to Ebarb.
Ilsa
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