It Is Our Music, It Is Our Dance

Early January, 1973. I first saw her when she walked into the LSU student newspaper office. I was the managing editor, and she was one of my new reporters. She asked if I had anything for her to do, and I set her on a story about the new chemistry building. I also gave her the two beats she’d requested -– religion and student government (separation of church and state wasn’t as much an issue back then).

A cold day in January,
cold for the South, anyway;
the smell of ink, newsprint,
people moving in and out,
bustling with the
self-importance of
young journalists;
assignments made, student
reporters dispatched, a smile
and a nod. The dance begins.

We started talking. I learned early that she was a painstaking perfectionist. (“It’s midnight; I have to put the paper to bed.” “I just need a few more minutes to get this right.”) We talked more. We got caught in a light snow one night, unheard of for south Louisiana. I think the snow was the clincher.

Feburary 14th. The flowers
were simple, really, red and
white mums with a
blue iris in the center. Staring
through the large window I
could see you walking to the
office, radiant, your arms
around an album. Godspell.
For me. At that moment, I knew
it was indeed a dance.

Within a month of our first meeting, we were talking about getting married. It just happened that way, like it was the most natural thing in the world. Looking back from that moment 37 years later, that’s exactly what it was. She took me home to Shreveport to meet her parents. She told me later that her parents were scared to death, not knowing what she was going to bring through the door. Their expectation was a long-haired, barefoot, hippie-type who smelled bad. Instead, in walked Joe Fraternity.

Two strong wills mixed
together into one
binding, one oneness and
it is granite hard, until
the softening starts, the
softening begins, at some time
I can’t remember. We weren’t
looking when he transformed
oneness into intimacy,
into lasting.

We were married in August, at 5 p.m. on a Saturday, not quite eight months after we met. She wore satin and lace and a Southern belle-type hat; I wore a light blue suit, bow tie and blue-and-white saddle oxfords. (Hey! Don’t laugh! It was the 70s, after all.) We were married at Mildred Crowe Baptist Church in Shreveport; the church building is still there but Mildred Crowe got renamed once or twice since then. The wedding ceremony lasted all of about six minutes and the reception perhaps an hour – there was a revival service starting at 7 p.m. and we had to be out of there.

I think of the girl who
gave her heart, who
thought I was worth
giving her heart to;
I think of the jolt
from my touch
on her skin, still.
The music is playing
just as loud, just as right;
the dance goes on.