My Story

On my 18th birthday my friend Jody Scott invited me to go roller skating with her. She was a pairs dancing Silver Medalist. At the time I didn’t know what that meant or that she could dance circles around me, literally! The rental skates were so bad the fellow in charge of renting them took pity on me and gave me a brand new pair to try. I ended up buying them and told Jody “I’m gonna catch my husband with these.” Less than a month later on 2 June 1954 I started to work in the mail room at Shell Oil Development Company in Emeryville, California. After work I went home to the government housing apartment in Richmond I shared with my father. I was excited about my new job and wanted to share that excitement with someone so I went to the local “hole in the wall” skating rink. After changing into my very short skirted skating costume I rolled out to the benches where Zeke, a friend of mine was lacing up his skates. “Hi Zeke!” The fellow next to him said

“You didn’t say hi to me!”

“I don’t know you.” I replied.

That was the beginning.

It was love at first sight but it wasn’t a whirlwind courtship like the love stories you read about. We didn’t have a courtship at all.