HAPPY ANNIVERSARY, MOM AND DAD
August 31, 2021
Today would have been my mother and father’s 59th wedding anniversary. Much love going out to them today.
There’s a backstory to their nuptials - one which I’m certain is most interesting but which, after all these years, I am still only partially aware of. Apparently Mom had been engaged to another fellow at some point, but broke it off; whether she broke it off before meeting Dad, or her decision was in fact the result of meeting Dad, is something I’ve never learned. Ultimately it doesn’t matter, but I can’t help but be curious. Mom didn’t talk about it much, other than to acknowledge that it did indeed happen. Dad - ever the jokester - used to carry around a newspaper clipping announcing her previous engagement, and whenever the two of them got into a spat he would pull the clipping out of his wallet and wave it around, saying “Well, you had your chance!”
And that would usually bring the argument to a screeching halt - sometimes with laughter on both sides, occasionally without.
The only things I know about my parents’ wedding beyond a reasonable doubt is that they were married on Aug. 31, 1962, at Crest Baptist Church in Midwest City, Oklahoma; and that I was born exactly nine months later on June 1, 1962. Now it’s no great secret that I’ve never been much good at math, but even I was able to do the computation on THAT one when I became old enough to understand such things…
Once, when I was a teenager and Melissa and I had been dating for a couple of years, I sort of casually remarked to her once while out someplace with my folks (probably having lunch at the local Bonanza Steak House one Sunday afternoon) that I had figured out that I was a “honeymoon baby.” Upon hearing this, Dad - usually the one who would go out of his way to make ribald and risqué comments, just to see how Mom would react - suddenly seemed all embarrassed and muttered something about how I had arrived earlier than expected.
To which my mom - much to the surprise of all of us, Dad most of all I think - just sort of grinned mischievously and responded, “Wanna bet?”
I can’t really explain why, and to be honest I’ve always been a little reluctant to put too much though into it, but that moment is one of my favorite memories of my parents…
Posted by John Allen Small. Posted In : Reminiscence
John A. Small is an award-winning newspaper journalist, columnist and broadcaster whose work has been honored by the Oklahoma Press Association, the Society of Professional Journalists, the Associated Press, the National Newspaper Association, and the Oklahoma Education Association. He and his wife Melissa were married in 1986; they have two sons, Joshua Orrin (born 1991) and William Ian (born 1996).
Mr. Small is the News Editor and columnist for the Johnston County Capital-Democrat, a weekly newspaper headquartered in Tishomingo, OK. He obtained his nickname, "Bard of the Lesser Boulevards," from a journalism colleague - the late Phil Byrum - in recognition of the success of his popular newspaper column, "Small Talk." (In addition to the many awards the column itself has received over the years, a radio version of "Small Talk" earned an award for "Best Small Market Commentary" from the Society of Professional Journalists in 1998.)
John was born in Oklahoma City in 1963; lived in the Bradley-Bourbonnais-Kankakee area of Illinois for most of the next 28 years (with brief sojourns in Texas and Athens, Greece, thrown in to break up the monotony); then returned to his native state in 1991, where he currently resides in the Tishomingo/Ravia area. He graduated from Bradley-Bourbonnais Community High School in 1981, and received his bachelor's degree in journalism from Olivet Nazarene University in Bourbonnais in 1991. The years between high school and college were a period frought with numerous exploits and misadventures, some of which have become the stuff of legend; nobody was hurt along the way, however, which should count for something.
In addition to his professional career as a journalist he has published two short story collections: "Days Gone By: Legends And Tales Of Sipokni West" (2007), a collection of western stories; and "Something In The Air" (2011), a more eclectic collection. He was also a contributor to the 2005 Locus Award-nominated science fiction anthology "Myths For The Modern Age: Philip Jose Farmer's Wold Newton Universe," edited by Win Scott Eckert. In additon he has written a stage play and a self-published cookbook; served as project editor for a book about the JFK assassination entitled "The Men On The Sixth Floor"; and has either published or posted on the Internet a number of essays, stories and poems.
He has also won writing awards from the Veterans of Foreign Wars and the National Library of Poetry. He is a past president of the Johnston County Chamber of Commerce in Tishomingo; was a charter member and past president of the Johnston County Reading Council, the local literacy advocacy and "friends of the library" organization; served as Johnston County's first-ever Americans with Disabilities Act coordinator in 1994-95; served two terms as chairman of the Johnston County (OK) Democratic Party; and has taught journalism classes for local Boy Scout Merit Badge Fairs. He is a member of the New Wold Newton Meteorics Society.
