| |
Love,
Marriage, & Weddings
Texas Style"By
all means, marry.
If you marry a good woman you will be happy.
If you
marry a bad woman you will become a philosopher." - Socrates |  |
Romance
Valentine’s
Day by Mike Cox 2-14-08
Must have been around Valentine’s
Day in 1877 when a young man named Donaho took pen in hand to write a love letter
to his sweetheart in Dallas... A
Texas-Norwegian-German Valentine
2-14-08
'No Person Shall Put Asunder' by Benard Burson - A synopsisSpeak
for yourself, Robert by Archie P. McDonald
Sam Houston was a man of many
loves... Outlaw
Letter by Mike Cox
An outlaw's love letter in 1878Pirate
chieftain Jean Laffite and Polly CrowThe
Espersons - The "Mr. and Mrs. Esperson Buildings".Lillian
by George Lester
"Probably every boy has had a crush on a girl who didn't
even know he was alive. It happened to me."
Romance
at Spunky Flat or Little Schoolhouse in the Cotton Field
Weddings
& Elopements HistoricalFunerals
have changed, but this wedding was old-timey by Delbert Trew
9-15-09
In the early days of my youth all
my country neighbors and friends had a "funeral suit" or dress hanging in the
closet. Bought and kept for that purpose, it showed utmost respect for the deceased
when worn at a funeral...
Common
Scents: Why Brides Carry Bouquets by Maggie Van Ostrand 6-1-09
Everybody
loves a bride. Why, women love to see one almost as much as we love to be one,
especially a June bride...
Indian Stories by
Mike Cox 2-19-09
Shortly before
the Civil War, Indians nearly spoiled a wedding...
Early settlers
threw mega-wedding by Delbert Trew 5-13-08
Strict,
religious Mexican laws allowed for unusual ceremony
There was a time in Texas
history when our grand state still belonged to Mexico, where the law required
all Colonists to adopt the Catholic faith to become Mexican citizens... Complicating
the problem, only marriages performed by a Catholic priest were recognized...The
Tailor and the Hideaway Bride: The man who kept his wife in stitches
The
Bride, He Wore White by John Troesser
Or How Men Wed in 1953 Waco
Right
lubrication greases squeakiest of wheels by Delbert Trew
Many classic
Old West tales are similar in plot but different in location. The following tale
has been told many times with the same plot but featuring different ranches, different
characters and different tunes. The original story is probably true, but where
it happened is anybody's guess. Our version here supposedly happened on the famed
XIT Ranch... For
Better or Worse by Louise George
In their own words some of yesterday’s
brides tell about their weddings and the early days of their marriages. Texas
Panhandle in the early 1900s. Drive-up
Wedding 1906
Opinion / Contemporary
MOB
vs. MOG by Elizabeth Bussey Sowdal 9-24-09
This
is my first go around as Mother of the Bride and it’s been fine so far. We’ve
got the gown, got the favors, lined up the photographer, talked to the wedding
coordinator at the church. Yesterday we lucked onto just what we were needing...
Wedding
Nightmare by Elizabeth Bussey Sowdal 8-3-09
It
is approximately 140 days until the wedding and some hidden time bomb of a countdown
timer in my brain must have just kicked on. I can imagine it like a big red alarm
clock – the old fashioned kind with two bells on top – nestled snugly in the soft
folds of my gray matter tick tock, tick tocking away... Wedding
Belles by Elizabeth Bussey Sowdal 3-27-09
Older
Daughter is getting married... I learned very early on in the planning process
exactly what my role will be....
Marriage
HistoricalAn
Introduction of Two Persons 3-9-09
From
"The Americanization of Edward Bok: The Autobiography of a Dutch Boy Fifty
Years After"
“Make the world a bit more beautiful and better because you
have been in it.” Belle
Christmas by Mike Cox 12-22-08
No matter how she
came to be called Belle Christmas, she had a reputation as a local character long
before someone dreamed up the “Keep Austin Weird” bumper sticker... Doe
and a Bride by Mike Cox
Anyone accidentally walking up on the young couple
sitting on a wagon tongue near Brushy Creek outside Round Rock that day would
have realized they discussed something very important. Indeed, their topic had
to do with the rest of their lives. Transitions
by Mike Cox
When you take time to think about it, everything in life is in
a state of transition. Back in 1921, a young Methodist preacher assigned to the
vastness of the South Plains approached a major transition – the adjustment from
single life to being married... Reconstruction
Valentine by Mike Cox
In modern chick-flick speak, Ansel "Hance" McKinney
must have had a "fear of commitment." Before marching off to fight for the South
at the beginning of the Civil War, the 23-year-old Goliad County cattleman gave
a ring to his younger sweetheart, 15-year-old Martha Campbell...
Opinion
I
Fear That My Wife Is Insane by Byron Browne
10-2-09
I fear that my wife is insane. There can be no other reason
for her continued presence here in our home. Any rational, right-thinking person
would have been packed and gone months ago. Yet, she stays and even finds a way
to maintain a smile on that marvelous, olive-skinned countenance of hers...Holiday
Season by Peary Perry 9-11-09
Anyone
who has had married children or in laws of their own should be able to identify
with what I’m about to say. This time of the year (the holiday season) puts an
enormous amount of stress on family relationships... Nine
Phrases Women Use by Peary Perry 7-29-09
I
promise that this will be the last article I write about my youngest son getting
married... Battle
of the sexes by
Peary Perry 7-22-09
Anyone
who has been married as long as I have can certainly relate to what I am about
to say. It really makes little difference how long you have been married, there
are always going to be daily challenges to your relationship... Father-Son
Talk by Peary Perry 7-16-09
Our
youngest son is getting married in a few weeks. Men
Watch Survivorman, Women Watch Holmes on Homes
by Peary Perry 5-6-09
I wonder if anyone
has performed an extensive study on how television has changed marriages over
the past fifty years...Special
Occasion by Peary Perry 4-23-09Keepsakes?
by Peary Perry 4-15-09
I’m
beginning to think the nomads and the Mongols had the best approach…..throw everything
away….keep nothing but what you need to feed yourself and your clothes.
What
happened after the move by Peary Perry 4-12-09
Anyone
who has been married for any length of time can identify with what I am about
to say... How
Women Think or How They Don’t Think by Peary Perry 3-25-09
Once
you’re married, she’ll begin to collect and save things you cannot begin to imagine.
You give her a Valentines Day card? She’ll save it. Birthday cards? Never thrown
away. Mothers Day cards? She’ll keep them until she dies and then they’ll pass
onto someone else, God only knows who... Moving
by Peary Perry 2-18-09
After
nearly twenty months we have finally sold our home and will be moving in a week
or so. I say a week or so, because it isn’t me that is in charge of this move.
It’s my wife... Happy
Trails by Elizabeth
Bussey Sowdal 5-9-08
By the time you read this I will
be a long gone baby! Our vacation, the first in two years (two really awful years,
if you want to know), will be well underway... “I
Now Thee Wed”, Half a Century Later…. by N. Ray Maxie
FLASHBACK TO 1957…..
We, the 1957 McLeod Longhorn seniors, each and everyone had our head full of dreams,
all twenty-one of us. Life was new and fresh for this small group of eighteen-year-old
wannabes... A
Blessed Event by Elizabeth Bussey Sowdal
This week Mike and I have had
a taste of what it is going to be like when our empty nest is truly and finally
empty...
Delicious Crow by Elizabeth
Bussey Sowdal
I flipped out this weekend. I lost my temper and I told my husband
everything - and I mean every single thing - that I was thinking... Subtext
by Elizabeth Bussey Sowdal
We have... evolved a different way of expressing
our irritation. When we are stressed out by circumstances, tired, down-trodden
and cranky we do not throw dishes or scream, "I hate you, ya big poo- head." ...
Instead we have subtexts...
The
Truth About Love by Elizabeth Bussey Sowdal
Here it is, the truth about
love. Some of you know it already. Some of you will read it and scoff. "Ha!" you
will say, "what does she know about it? Obviously nothing! She knows nothing about
love, real love, true love." I can hear you saying that now. And I have to tell
you two things... Man
Should Not Live Alone by Peary Perry
As I recall somewhere it is written,
"Man should not live alone." I don't remember if this is in the bible or some
other place, but as whoever wrote it (God?) was a really smart fellow, or person
(to be gender sensitive)... Men
I Wanted to Marry by Elizabeth Bussey SowdalHome
Improvement by Elizabeth Bussey Sowdal
"It is the strong marriage
that survives each spring without a tremor or two."Butter
Manners by Elizabeth Bussey Sowdal
"The women in our family can be
as sweet and mild as milk through all kinds of adversity. But everyone has their
breaking point..."Love
is in the Hair by Elizabeth Bussey Sowdal
"In the early years of
our marriage, romance was a challenge... "
Two
addendums to vows help marriage to last by Delbert Trew
"Unlike the
Ten Commandments, which were chiseled in stone to prevent erasure or change, marriage
vows are merely spoken. This allows these sacred promises to be forgotten, ignored,
misunderstood, changed or deleted by the modern-day theory of "doing whatever
feels good at the moment." ...‘Harmful
to Marriage' Questions by Peary Perry
"A question such as this requires
extreme diplomacy, tact and sensitivity training to answer properly. Having said
that, let me add… give it up you and I don’t have the ability to do this. If you
can, run…." 50-50
VS 110% by Peary Perry
"Marriage is not all wine and roses, sometimes
its vinegar and weeds."Fayetteville
Photographer William Tauch
Doomed
"To love and win is the best thing; to love and lose the next
best."
- William Makepeace Thackeray. Six
Degrees of Separation, or, How a Mexican Star Became a Cajun Legend by Maggie
Van Ostrand 5-6-09
Evangeline
and Gabriel
Pansy
by Mike Cox 2-26-09
Though her
looks could have given her a shot at Hollywood, Pansy opted for the circus world.
She and her husband had a trapeze act in a traveling show. They drew big crowds
and made good money. All that changed in a moment. ...A
Gruesome Prophecy Tattooed on a Soldier’s Breast
2-8-09Indian
Emily by Mike Cox 10-2-08
One of the most romantic stories in the lore of the Old West originated at Fort
Davis. The tale has been told and retold in all media. It’s the story of Indian
Emily and goes like this: In the late 1860s, an Apache female fell wounded in
a skirmish between cavalry troops stationed at Fort Davis and her band....The
White Lady of Rio Frio
by Linda Kirkpatrick
The love triangle of Gregorio, Maria and Anselmo
Schulenburg's
Heartbreak HotelLeaping
Lovers by Mike Cox
Knowing their love can never be, the young couple stare
at the swirling river far below. One last kiss, and then, holding hands, they
leap off the cliff, united forever in death - and legend.
Texas has at least
four landmarks known as Lover's Leaps ...Metheglin
Creek by Clay Coppedge
How
the creek got its name
Old
Buddy George by George Lester
Where
are you Benny Goodenberger?
by Perry Peary
In his last letter, he wrote ”Mom, I am worried about this
trip…if, by chance anything should happen to me, there is this girl, Benny Goodenberger,
in …………, and I’d like you to tell her what happened to me.”
WhereMother
Neff State Park by Clay Coppedge
"It's especially popular with couples
who want to say "I do" amid the oak, elm, juniper and cottonwood trees near the
banks of the Leon River. The park is the setting for about 30 weddings a year."
Love's
Lookout by Bob Bowman
Perched atop a scenic forested ridge beside U.S.
Highway 69 north of Jacksonville, Love's Lookout offers perhaps the grandest view
in East Texas.
What
The
Wedding Oak, San Saba, Texas
IssuesHarvard
Strangles First Amendment
... and what women really want
MiscellaneousMy
Heart on a Sleeve
by Gael Montana 2-3-08
"...Valentine's
Day has traditionally been the scene of massive romantic disasters around here.
My husband and I even waited to get hitched until two days afterwards to avoid
that pesky dark cloud. If you recall, Chicago has a rather grisly connection with
Valentine's Day..."
The
Saddest Valentine by John Troesser
True love prevails by
Mike Cox
Or outsmarts his girl’s dad
Vintage
Wedding PhotosVattmann,
TexasFayetteville,
TexasGranger,
Texas
Travel Reservations
- Book Here & Save:
Hotels | Cars
| Air | Cruises
|
|
|
Recommended
Books
Texas: Romantic Weekends |
| |
|
