(Left to Right) - Judy Snell, Loma King, Floyd King, Karen (King) Clymer, Rev. Howard Snell, George Clymer, Lula Clymer and Roy Clymer
Please allow me to reminisce on this our 41st wedding anniversary and mention some of our Memory Treasures. It was a gorgeous Saturday afternoon, September 14, 1974 in Enid, OK. that George and I married. However, we had a couple of humorous things happen earlier in the day.
That morning George decided to change the oil in my recently purchased 1974 Dodge full size van, two tone blue in color. My cousin, Rev. Howard Snell, who was going to be performing our marriage ceremony that afternoon, had gone with George. The job was finished except that George noticed the oil pressure would not come up even though he had poured five quarts of oil in the crank case. He immediately stopped the engine, jumped out, lifted the hood, checked the oil and saw there was not a drop of oil on the oil stick. He immediately looked on the ground and to his shock, all the oil had drained on the ground. He said he knew immediately that he had forgotten to put in the oil plug before pouring in the oil. Pastor Snell immediately reminded him it was his wedding day and he was nervous and assured him it could have happened to anyone. Bro. Snell never tired of retelling this true story. Over and again people would approach us through the years and ask George about changing oil on his wedding day. He knew immediately who had told them. What a fun memory treasure!
That afternoon, shortly before my cousin Judy Snell and I prepared to leave her house to go to the church for the wedding, I stepped into the bathroom and found myself standing in about two inches of water. I yelled for Judy to come quick. With no time to call a plumber, Judy immediately started grabbing towels, towels and more towels and together we threw them onto the floor to hopefully, keep the water from spreading to another room and then hurried to the church for the wedding. Judy and I will never forget that experience and how happy we are that there was no one there with a camera. It is another fun wedding day memory treasure!
After our wedding, George and I left immediately for Northern New England, (Maine, Vermont and New Hampshire), to conduct a series of Kids Krusades scheduled to begin in one week. It made for an ideal honeymoon trip through states we had never seen. Let me set the stage for the next happenings. George was from a tiny farm community in western Oklahoma and I was from a tiny rural town in southwest Oklahoma. Eating out was almost unheard of for both of us. I had been traveling in child evangelism for approximately eighteen months. George had hardly been out of the state. Therefore, while in Northern New England we definitely showed our ignorance on a number of occasions, but fortunately the people were patient and gracious. Instead of being intimidated by our ignorance and the embarrassement we brought on ourselves, we loved, laughed and learned together.
Four humorous memory treasures that we call, Rural Okie 'speak' versus Yankee 'speak':
1. At a restaurant in Maine called, The Bradford House, we were celebrating one month of marriage. For dessert George told the waitress he wanted, "a piece of apple pie with ice cream on top of it.” “Okay, Sir”, she said, “you want apple pie à la mode.” That country boy had never heard the term à la mode. He immediately ‘corrected’ her stating, “No ma’am, I want a piece of apple pie with ice cream on top of it.” I nudged him and told him it was the same. We have laughed again and again and figure she went straight to the kitchen and laughed uncontrollably about the country hicks with a weird accent that didn't even know what pie à la mode was. We had just had our first lesson in Yankee 'speak' versus rural Okie 'speak'.
2. One evening after the Kids Krusade the pastor's wife, Jean, told me we had been invited out for pizza and grinders. Pizza was a familiar food, but not grinders. What in the world was a grinder? Jean explained it was a hoagie. Hoagie? We didn't know that term either. Patiently she explained that it was a sandwich in a big long bun. "Okay, you mean a submarine sandwich." We had just had our second lesson in Yankee 'speak' versus rural Okie 'speak'.
3. George came back to the car with a most comical look of surprise on his face carrying a chocolate dip cone in each hand. "I told the lady I wanted two dips of vanilla ice cream and this is what she gave me," he explained. Again, Jean came to the rescue by telling us that in Northern New England you order ice cream by the scoop instead of by the dip. She further explained that dip is what you say if you want a chocolate dip cone. We had just had another lesson in Yankee 'speak' versus rural Okie 'speak'.
4. Once while looking for a particular location we asked for directions and the individual told us to go to the 'rotary' and we would see our destination. He went on to say we couldn't miss it. However, we did miss it over and again. Finally, after driving until we were nearly dizzy and after two or three more individuals had given us the same instructions and assured us that we could not miss it, we asked one more person. Imagine our embarrassment when he said, "go back down to the 'traffic' rotary ......." We didn’t wait to hear another word. We simply thanked the man and laughed and laughed at our ignorance. We had been looking for a building – a Rotary Club building. We had just had another lesson in Yankee 'speak' versus rural Okie 'speak'.
You have heard that ignorance is BLISS! Oh no, it is not! It is downright EMBARRASSING!
However, forty one years later we are still laughing and loving each other. How we thank the Lord for bringing us together. Our wedding songs were: Each for the Other and Both for the Lord and God Made You for Me.