In May of 1966 I was again unemployed and as I have previously stated found myself standing in line at the Unemployment Office. I was embarrassed to be there on the one hand, mostly because I looked like I was going to deliver any day, in reality I was only 3 months pregnant. The good thing was that Lee was close to finishing school and I would not be needing to collect unemployment money for very long.
In September of 1966 Lee graduated from Nursing School and it was a happy,happy day for our little family of Lee and I and our son. We were so proud of Lee, he had received an award "Most improved in patient care." The last three years of hard work had culminated into this graduation night.
I doubt if anyone except Lee and I and our son could possible realize how many sacrifices or how much hard work went into reaching our goal. Our parents and some friends attended Lee's graduation. As I have stated before Lee's parent's never really valued education. They seemed to be short sighted in that respect, and apparently unaware of the monetary benefits of an education. His parents gave him a graduation card with a five dollar bill for his gift. We were stunned and hurt that they apparently did not value his efforts more than that. Upon reaching this goal we were launched into a new life, Lee already had a job offer at the local Community Hospital. His starting pay was $2.52/hour, but we were happy and thought we were millionaires. Lee took his Nursing Boards in October and it would be February before he received the results.
On November 5th,1966 our daughter was born, she weighed 8# 9oz. My labor presented differently than our son and I was not sure if I was really in labor. Lee kept trying to get me to go to the hospital. Our son had one of his cousins staying over for the night and he was not happy that I had "chosen" that particular night to have the baby. "Can't you wait until tommorrow Mom?" By this time I was feeling like "this is it". So Lee took our nephew home which was only a ten minute ride, and dropped our son off at his brother's house. By the time Lee arrived back home I was in active labor and wondered if I would even make it to the hospital. It was only a 10 minute drive to the hospital, but believe me it was not a pleasant ride. By the time I was admitted and got to Labor/Delivery I was 8cm and delivered a short time later. They literally ran down the hall with me on the stretcher to the delivery room. Our little family was growing, now instead of three of us which is the way it was for 6 years, now there were 4 of us. It is amazing how the last 3 years faded into the distance so rapidly. We kind of just picked up where we left off and continued to move forward. In February of 1967 Lee received his notification that he had passed his Nursing Boards. Shortly after that Lee received a direct commission into The Army Nurse Corp as a 2nd Lt. He received his orders at that time and was on his way to Fort Sam Houston in San Antonio, Texas where he spent 6 weeks Basic Training.
I stayed in New York with the children. Our son still had to finish the school year which in NY was June. During the intervening time the moving van showed up at our house and packed us up. It was quite an experience for me. I knew nothing about the process and to make matters more complicated Lee was not home yet. They tell you that the movers will take care of everything and they pretty much do, but I had to separate out the kids clothes, and our clothes. plus anything you thought you might need before the moving van pulls up at your new residence. The packers will pack EVERYTHING, even a wastebasket full of trash or in one case the sheets that I had just removed from our mattress were packed. Believe me, I learned very quickly to get our stuff in one corner away from the packers. They are very fast and there were a few mishaps the first couple of moves, but we got the hang of it pretty quick. For Lee's first duty station he was assigned to Fort Sill, Oklahoma. Neither one of us had any experience traveling out of state, and we started out on this huge trip to Oklahoma with 2 kids and a dog and a 2 door Pontiac full of our worldly possessions. Youth definitely has it's advantages and we were so happy, excited, and looking for new challenges and excitement. Actually, it didn't take long after we started our trek across the U.S. before things started happening. We were not really lookinf for this kind of excitement.
Until next time, BE SAFE AND ENJOY EACH OTHER!!
Carol
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