Anniversary

Since my computer is permitting me to work with it today and may not grant me entry tomorrow, I am a day early in celebrating my parents' 85th wedding anniversary. June 30, 1924, was their day. She was 27 and he was 26. They had been engaged for five years and both worked as teachers, saving their money so they could eventually marry. She had an earlier engagement which was never discussed until she was close to the end of her life when I coaxed the name from her: he was a Boyle, brother to our Aunt Mary O'Connell. I don't know his first name and don't know what became of him, but there were hard feelings over the breakup that never really eased over all those years. Anyway, my mother wore her sister Stella's wedding gown, veil, and shoes. Aunt Stella was a smaller person than my mother, so I'm thinking the dress probably was a little short and I know the shoes were not the right size. They were white satin, with a button closure across the instep and a tiny 2" spool heel and she said she could harldly walk in them, could hardly get down the aisle! I don't know what became of the dress and veil; maybe it's in one of the Dolan attics, but we had the darling little shoes. They celebrated their 49th anniversary a few months before my dad died in 1973.