June 20, 1957

My former sister-in-law included this picture in her Christmas card which I received yesterday.  She and the rest of my first husband's family live in Indiana. When Jerry and I divorced in 1967  he moved back to Indiana from California with most of our possessions which were ultimately destroyed in a barn fire. Occasionally Judy unearths a previously unseen photo or bit of memorabilia that escaped the fire and sends it to me.  This is one of those items.  

The picture was taken at my high school graduation from Hollywood High. just four days after my seventeenth birthday.  Jerry was just 19.  It's a picture I have never seen before.  When I first saw it I was almost overcome with emotion.  63 years have passed since the shutter snapped on that picture and the joy and happiness I see on our faces are the things I prefer to remember about our life together even though those things were not always a part of our life.  We were married in September of 1960 and that happy event was followed by the births of our two children, Lisa first and then Mark.  We parted ways after seven years together. There were some difficult moments in the years that followed but in the end, we still found we had an unbroken bond that remained intact.  I have only one regret and that is that Jerry did not live to see his children become the amazing adults they are today.  He would be very proud.  

I