It was early evening when we landed and I called our building principal, Burton Cave, to tell him I would need a sub for my classroom the next day. “You need to get one for Ruth VanBruggen too. We eloped over the week-end.”
“Sure you did. Is she going to drive truck with you too?”
Funny thing. About three weeks before school started that fall, several of the male members of the teaching staff from the junior high decided it would be a good idea for me to call Burton to play a joke on him. While we all planned the joke, I did the talking. I told him I had driven truck all summer and I liked my new job. I was going to quit teaching and become a teamster. He bought the story before he heard everyone laughing in the background, and he wasn’t going to fall for another one of my “jokes”.
“No really”, I pleaded. “I’m telling the truth. We both need subs. We’ll be in later in the morning to explain.” I leaned out of the phone booth so he could hear the announcement “flight 702 to Tokyo, Japan is now boarding”. He heard it, laughed and said, “Ok, I’ll see the two of you tomorrow.”
We drove back to Kalamazoo and spent the night with Chuck at our apartment. The next morning we drove to Ruth’s mom and dad’s house in Plainwell. Her dad was working, but we spoke with her mom and that conversation was the key to dry eyes. We recounted the weekend’s events, and once again, I committed myself to taking care of Ruth.
After speaking with her mom, Ruth and I drove over to the junior high. The place exploded. Turns out Burton couldn’t keep a secret. “They’re here! They’re here!” rang out from students hanging out from the classroom windows. As we walked up the stairs towards Burton’s office, kids rushed out to see us and talk, teachers shook our hands, and more than one welled up with tears. We were about to become the biggest story the town had shared in years.
We met briefly with Burton who gave me $8.00 from petty cash so we could “have lunch”. It was decided we would return to work on Thursday. We each visited our classroom, stopped along the way to meet with others, and were preparing to return to Ruth’s parents to see her dad when we discovered my car had been decorated while we were inside making the rounds. There was toilet paper wrapped inside and out and rice everywhere. It was a fun mess from a bunch of people who loved us. Students filled the school’s front lawn, and cheers rang out again, as we “unwrapped” the car.
We drove back to Ruth’s parent’s house to vacuum out the rice and meet with her dad. There were a few tears from Ruth and Kate, but all in all the meeting went well. Lou, Ruth’s dad, was going to be OK with all of this. That was a huge relief to me. While we were there, Ruth called her sisters, Kathy and Shirley so they were in the loop with all that had taken place.
My sister, Sharron, was student teaching in Grand Rapids about a half hour from Plainwell. I wanted to tell her the news in person, so we drove up to her school. She was in an after school staff meeting, and I had her called out so we could speak with her. We briefly recounted the week-ends events and then started off on our drive to Royal Oak to break the news to my parents.
My dad was washing dishes when we walked in the side door into the kitchen. He turned around and asked what we were doing home. I told him that we came to tell them we had eloped. His reply still rings clearly in our ears, “What the hell did you do that for?” and he turned to complete the dishes. My mom came down the hall and was a bit more subtle and excited. Both were obviously surprised. Heck, so were Ruth and I.
Mom called my Aunt Ruth and Uncle Harry and my Aunt Phillis and Uncle Harry. (Yes, I had two Uncle Harrys.) I called my college roommate, Gary, and his wife, Susan. Everyone came over and we recounted the events again and again as each couple arrived. My youngest sister, Jackie, joined us after her shift at Baskin-Robbins. Surprise!.
That’s how the long week-end went. We didn’t know at the time, but several people were circling the month of May 1972 on their calendars.
TBC