Shannon here: Jeanette-Marie Mirich shares insight into her real life romance, plus a chance to win book one, The Courtship of Harry’s Wife and two, The Last Roses in her D.B. Burns Mysteries series, a bookmark, and two $10 dollar gift certificates to Starbucks. Comment or answer the question in this post to enter the drawing. Deadline: May 9th, 11:59 pm central time. Here’s Jeanette:
Life on the Stoop and Other places:
If they weren’t home, my parents wouldn’t let us in the house even though we were engaged. It was the sixties and everything under the sun was occurring from protests to weed, rock music to kissing in back seats of cars. We sat on the stoop. It was interesting.
We shivered, held hands, and talked, knowing that the English professor across the street was watching, as was the retired Navy Commander and his wife who peered out the window at us. It was a small college town and we couldn’t hide. The stoop was one step up from the walk leading to our home and three by four in size. Even in an English fog bank the neighbors would KNOW.
The tiny one-story house on Harrison street had traffic day and night, no privacy. It was Oregon and rained nine months of the year, so it was a damp venue. However, the stoop was preferable to the wrath of my father, a World War II vet with moral courage, upright demeanor, and the gift of pithy words fit for any occasion. Not a man to test if you valued continuing the relationship. Which we did.
Our time of dating during engagement also had an occasional car ride. Rod’s red MG Midget was cute, but impractical. There was enough room for a brown bagged lunch and my purse. In mid-summer we took a drive to Mary’s Peak, the highest mount in the coastal range. Rod worked for the Forest Service during college and the summer before his medical school began. And, he had the key to the winding trails that serpentine the peak. He unlocked the yellow gate, drove through, then relocked it behind us. He restarted the engine—easy for him—a challenge for me with its tricky clutch and jiggling the gear shift to get it in gear.
Mary’s Creek tumbled down the forested sides of the mountain and chuckled over the rocks as it headed toward the flat Willamette Valley. Driving along it we stopped to check out the frogs that sang their wood song among the Douglas Firs. Then we nibbled on sandwiches, feasting on each other’s eyes and not the tuna fish with pickles.
Eventually we came to a washed-out part of the road. A road the forest service had trouble maintaining. We looked at one another. Rod’s little car was so low (the midget name wasn’t a mistake) that we might get high centered or veer off the road and shudder down the mountain side. But being narrow was an advantage.
Rod studied the land, sat back on his heels and investigated the car’s clearance and the distance between the wheels. Then, he went on a hunt, disappearing into the forest and emerging with a log. It had been limbed and cast aside. Waiting for us, I think. With careful placement, my fiancé lined up the log a couple of feet away from the remaining roadway.
“I don’t want you hurt,” he said as he looked from me to the washout. He didn’t yet know my adventurous spirit but I nodded and walked along the narrow edge to the other side of the gully.
He revved the car, put it in gear and, balancing left wheels on the log and right wheels on the remaining narrow bit of roadway, careened across the ravine. Okay, it wasn’t exactly fifty feet down and staring at death, but the little car was about all he had in assets, except for his fjord blue eyes and dimpled smile.
That day I knew Rod was a keeper. Whatever we navigated, he might have an interesting solution, or with his stubborn (in Finnish it is called Sisu—meaning uber stubborn) attitude, we’d manage.
Over the years we’ve had many rocky places on our journey, from stoop sitting to treacherous car rides in Africa. Perhaps for us, romance is summed up in sacrifice, ingenuity, and laughter at the surprising circumstances tossed our way.
About Jeanette: “Have bags will travel” should be Jeanette-Marie Mirich’s life’s theme. She moved twenty-two
times before settling in her first home. An Oregonian by birth who graduated with a B.S. degree in education from Portland State University, Jeanette has swum in the Ligurian Sea and collected shells and sea glass along the Indian Ocean, Pacific, Atlantic, Caribbean Oceans, Straits of Malacca, Gulf of Mexico, and the Andaman Sea. Her peripatetic lifestyle is courtesy of the U.S. Air Force and her husband’s medical training.
Passionate about needs in the third world after living in Thailand during her husband’s deployment, she has accompanied her husband on dozens of medical mission trips. Mother of three, Grammy to thirteen exceptional grandchildren, she travels from her Kentucky home to an Oregon cabin, scribbling poems and short stories as well as writing novels.
Her first novel, Happy Christmas, Miss Lawrence, won second place in the Colorado Independent Publishers’ EVVY awards. Her second novel, Shadow Games, received honorable mention. Both novels were published by Stonebridge Publications. The Courtship of Harry’s Wife, the first book in her D. B. Burns Mysteries series, released in September of 2019 from Mountain Brook Ink. Book two, The Last Roses, releases May 1, 2020. Learn more: Jeanette’s Website
About the book – The Last Roses (D. B. Burns Mysteries #2):
On a trip home from North Carolina, Delilah Burns Morgan is stopped in her tracks by a deer she whacks into oblivion. Lyle Henderson, the man she loves but put off marrying, comes to her rescue. Life would be a bed of roses if, during a week of recovery at the Henderson family estate, a lascivious conversation hadn’t been overheard, the mystery of a dead girl is revealed, and someone using Lyle’s cabin in the woods as a rendezvous hadn’t altered their plans.
Then Delilah’s beloved god-daughter and best friend’s only child is kidnapped. With Josephine in tow, Delilah sets out to bring Savannah back home. Roping in friends for help, Delilah’s neighborhood burgeons with former clandestine government officers setting up an op center and Lyle and her minister disappearing to follow leads. An attempt to fricassee Delilah and a pompous businessman make Delilah and Lyle determined to unearth the villains and find Savannah before it’s too late.
Can’t wait for the drawing, worried you won’t win or interested in Jeanette’s other books? Get your copies now:
Jeanette’s books – Mountainbrook Ink
Question for Readers: What dating rules did your parents have for you?
Come back May 1st for Carole Brown!
Much to my mother’s chagrin, my parents’ dating rules didn’t get challenged very much because I didn’t date a whole lot in high school–even after she had our living room redecorated with the expertise of a real interior designer. I always felt a little guilty that her beautiful room didn’t get used often for the intended purpose of entertaining boyfriends!
What a wonderful dating story you have, however, Jeanette! He does sound like a keeper, but Go ARMY!
I have a grandson who is going to be ROTC as was my Dad. My hubby was a flight surgeon because he liked the complications of aerospace medicine and flight crews.
Dating in high school wasn’t my cups either. Beautiful rooms have nothing on a heart.
My parents had the same rule for me, Jeanette. Lots of days and nights, we sat on the front porch or in lawn chairs. We have the same rule for our 18 year old son too. Him and his girlfriend sit on our screened in back porch or go for a ride in his side by side. If they get here and we’re on our way within 15 or 20 minutes, we let them come inside until we get here.
We had it for our kids as well. Parents understand that hormones are active in young people and have the wisdom to do defensive measures.
if I went out home by 11 and must let them know if I would be late, no dates on school nights and when I started, had to be with a group, had to know where I would be
Lovely of your parents to protect you. I even had a child who asked me to call at 10:30 when a party was going on so she could blame me and come home
My parents didn’t let me date in high school. I dated two guys during my college years.
Well a dated a couple of times in high school and found it boring. My hubby and I met my freshman year of college and his senior. We married nine months later. So…we did sit on the doorstep, because I lived at home while in college but, he’s a keeper. P.S. I finished school while he was in medical school and we’ve had 52 years of loving. As he says, “Not quite enough.”
I wasn’t allowed to date until I was sixteen. My parents also had the rule of not allowing us in the house if no one was home. I also could not go on a date unless the young man came to my house and met my parents. I have seven older brothers and sisters so this usually meant the phone tree was activated and whomever was available showed up to greet my young man as well. One time in particular It was around Thanksgiving and we had family it town staying with us. This meant I went to stay at my brother and sister-in-law’s house. I told my date to call me when he left his house and I would meet him at mine. However, he waited to call me and ended up getting to my house before me where he was completely surrounded by my immediate and extended family.
My Parents would not let us be in the house if they were not home and when they were we always sit on the porch and was always within eye site! Had to be home by 11 and no going out on school night!
Love is so protective. Sometimes we may rail against it but God sets up boundaries as do parents. Kept me out of trouble.
In 7th grade, a boy named Daniel and I had a mutual crush on each other…right up until he got teased for my being taller than he. That was devastating to a gawky adolescent and contributed to my quiet shyness throughout my dateless High School years. SO…no rules! In fact, my parents, both of whom dated a lot in HS, were a little concerned that my social life largely consisted of church youth group. Three years at an all-girl hospital nursing school program didn’t help my prospects any either. Later, while working as a nurse, I met a med student through a mutual friend. After a rocky courtship (a story for another day!) of about 3 years, we married and will celebrate 43 years in June. In that time we’ve been on some “dates” that’ve far exceeded any I could’ve imagined!
I have winners! Lisa C and Sharon Pera won the drawings. I appreciate Jeanette for being my guest and everyone else for stopping by.