How well I remember my first “wedding.” I was 5 years old and lived in a little, four-room, concrete-block house south of U.S. Route 30 in Fairview with my parents and siblings.

On the southeast corner of U.S. Route 30 and 12th Avenue was a combination gas station/cafe. There were no houses built behind the station. It was a sandy lot with some weeds. There was a big deep hole with a plank across it. My neighbor, Bobby Wolber, and I walked the plank as I held a bouquet of dandelions. The ceremony was exciting to a 5-year old girl with a crush on her cute neighbor boy.

I also remember walking to Dillon School when it first was built, carrying my lunchbox. I cut through the cornfield (where the junior high is now). When I came out of the field, my lunchbox was gone. I was so scared to tell Mom that first, I cut through the cornfield, and second, that I lost my lunchbox.