Nancy Wiseman Briner
Griffith’s funeral is at 11 o’clock this morning. I can’t be there in person,
but I’ll be there in memory and hope, because she was my first girlfriend, sort
of.
We were in the same class.
It was around 8th or 9th grade. A Sadie Hawkins Day
dance. Nancy asked me to go with her. I was honored, and I went, but she was a
forceful woman, [even then] and I was a backward boy [even now]. So, I never
followed up. Sixty years later, Nancy told me she had always been sorry I didn’t
follow up on our one date. But it was not personal. I was scared of all girls,
not just her.
In fact, the only other
girl I dated in Oakland City, three years later, was Nancy’s cousin, Phyllis.
She was patient with me, but even she got fed up with my backwardness, and in
senior year traded up to guy who was not only a better boyfriend, but
better-looking, which was quite embarrassing.
Nancy and I remained friends,
even though we didn’t see each other very often for the next 65 years, because
of distance. In our mature years, when I had gained some notice as a writer, she
asked me to mentor her in writing, and I was glad to do so. She was a good
writer. She and Helen and I would often spend time together around our
every-five-years class reunions.
Nancy and Helen had a
special appreciation for each other, because…
Helen and I were students
at IU, and we were going to get married in Bloomington, the first couple married
at the just-started St. Mark’s Methodist, where we attend now in retirement. In
those days, the 1950s, you had to get a marriage license in the county in which
one of you was a resident. Helen lived in Gary. It was closer to go to
Princeton to get our license.
Our class schedules were
tricky, and I was preaching at three little churches, which added to the
scheduling problems, so we were going down to Princeton on the last possible
day to get a license before our wedding day. On the way, I got the only moving
violation ticket in my 67 years of driving, ever since Mr. Oren Stuckey took
his life in his hands to teach Anne Turner and Carolyn Wilder and me as a
driving trio. I was so distracted by Anne and Carolyn that it’s amazing I
passed.
I was distracted enough by
Helen on the way to get our marriage license that I was stopped by a state
trooper, who took me immediately into Huntingburg to pay my fine. That was out
of the way, and we got behind schedule. We had also forgotten that Bloomington
and Princeton were in different time zones.
We pulled up to an austere and forbidding darkened Gothic courthouse. It was deserted. It was closed. Almost. A woman
was locking the doors even as we ran up the walk. She was doing it forcefully.
It was Nancy!
I calmly explained our
dilemma. Bad cop! Huntingburg way far! Mr. Stuckey not good teacher! Anne and
Carolyn! Stupid legislators make bad time zones! Last day!
Nancy looked like she was
rethinking her regret about the absence of my follow-up on the Sadie Hawkins
Day dance. “No problem,” she said. “I work in the clerk’s office. I’ll get you
a license.”
What a relief. Until I
opened my billfold to pay and realized that the driving ticket fine had taken
all my cash. [No credit cards in those days.] So Helen dug around in her purse
and found enough money to pay for our license.
I’m sure that Nancy
breathed a sigh of relief. “Thank goodness this loser never followed up on that
Sadie Hawkins dance. I really lucked out. He can’t even pay for a marriage
license.”
As I said, Helen and Nancy
had a special bond. Helen loved Nancy because she opened the court house that
day. Nancy loved Helen because she felt sorry for her.
Rest in peace, Nancy.
Thank you for honoring me by asking me to go to that dance with you. Thank you
for being my friend through so many years. And especially, thank you for that
marriage license.
John Robert McFarland
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