Ruby
Forty years ago tomorrow Shirley and I were married at St Martin's Church in the north Lincolnshire village of Owston Ferry. She was twenty two and I had just turned twenty eight. As I recall, it was a very happy day when that virtual champagne bottle was smashed across the bow of our marriage. "God bless her and all who sail in her". It was witnessed by friends and family. A good number of the attendees are not here any more - my mum Doreen and my older brother Paul, Shirley's parents Charlie and Winnie, my grandmother Phyllis and Shirley's grandmother Minnie, my friend Ron Budd who died of alcoholism and several of Shirley's aunts and uncles. They exist only in our memories. I can hear them in the next room. It was an inexpensive wedding. For example, the wedding breakfast was a simple buffet meal in a nearby pub and our wedding car was in fact Charlie's VW Passat driven by one of her many cousins. The weather was typical of late October - blustery b...
