October 20, 2009

Betty Ivey Whipple

There are nine of us Columbus girls who recently got together at the home of Cindy Strong Hayslett to celebrate our 60th birthday.

We all attended what was called Lee High back in the old days and through the years have remained close friends. It's honestly hard to believe that it really was the 'old' days, as we still remember those years at good ole Lee High so vividly.

The five of us birthday girls (who all graduated in 1967) included Cindy, Vicki Vassar Ptacek, Katherine Rice Parker, Debbie McNulty, and myself. The 'youngsters', Ginger Patton Vought, Carol Propst Mitchell, Betty Carr Wheat (all from the class of 68), and my baby sister, Cassie Ivey Derden (class of 70) came to celebrate with us and toast our arrival at this milestone of life.

After leaving high school, we had marched enthusiastically forward into life ... attending College, acquiring jobs, husbands and children. We had gone through school, courtships (sometimes with the same guy), marriages (thankfully, not with the same guy), births, divorces, and remarriages.

Some of us had married multiple times and even gave an award one year to the person who had been married the most. Having married the same man twice and then a third different man, my official name is Betty Ivey Studdard Ivey Studdard Ivey Whipple ... and I didn't even get the award, if that tells you anything.

We have celebrated together at our children's weddings, become grandparents, buried most of our parents, and even mourned the loss of one of our husbands. We've shared it all, and now, unbelievable as it feels to us, some of us have arrived at the ripe old age of 60. What??? Where on earth did the time go? Well, for us at least, much of this time through the years was spent together.

Over 20 years ago, we started making a yearly trek to Destin for a summer beach trip. Later we added a Christmas gathering. Since we had named ourselves the FITS girls (for Fun in the Sun), Christmas became FITSMAS. Most of us had been cheerleaders for the Caldwell or Joe Cook and/or the mighty Generals back in the late 60's, and I can still do every motion and sing every word to "Hey We're From Lee High"; though, admittedly, not quite as robustly as I could back then.

At one of our Christmas gatherings, Ginger, who was hosting at the time, took us on a memory lane trip back to the hallowed halls of Lee High. After viewing our old class pictures, noting that we all had the exact same flipped up hairdo, and visiting the trophy case in the foyer, we started feeling that old 'Maroon and White' spirit and decided to go to the gym and have a pep rally. Even though we managed to stumble through the V-I-C-T-O-R-Y cheer, most of our jumps at the end landed us on our backsides rather than our feet. Thankfully, 911 didn't have to be summoned. We still feel just as young on the inside, but our bodies don't necessarily cooperate anymore.

Through this journey of life that started for many of us in elementary school (Demonstration and Franklin Academy), we've clung together. We've remained friends, soul mates, confidants, sisters. We all agree that we've saved thousands of dollars over the years in therapy sessions that we did not need, because we provided that for each other. We have hundreds of stories, and we love to tell them over and over again. The older we get the more we realize that we need this, because our memories are starting to fail us. But we are finding it is true what they say.....As you get older, your short term memory fails, but you can still recall vividly a story that took place back in high school.

Cindy recently had knee surgery and being pretty much house-bound, she felt it would be fun and a boost to her spirits for us to gather for a birthday celebration. Besides, it was only fitting that she do this, because we still remember the year she threw HERSELF a 'surprise' birthday party. We had planned a last-minute fishing weekend in Jackson, MS, at Carol's house, and it happened to fall on Cindy's birthday. She and her husband had already made plans to attend a Southern football game that weekend, and she wasn't going to be able to attend. Well, she just couldn't stand it. She ditched Fred in Hattiesburg, and drove to Jackson. We were all out back fishing, when she showed up carrying a birthday cake and balloons, singing, "Happy Birthday to Me." It was a perfect moment.

As always, when the FITS girls gather, there was lots of laughter. But this time it was a little different in that we had much 'bearing of souls' and sharing of troubles and even tears. It was one of those times that we seemed to have had more need to reach out and give and take comfort from each other in the struggles we are currently facing, than the mindless banter, crazy antics, and stomach crunching laughter that usually dominates our togetherness. Cindy is the one who has always seemed to have the world by the tail, having planned her life well and retired with her husband to wonderful travels in their RV. But with her recent surgery, which brought on some additional complications, she now claims that 60 is the age that is not only officially OLD, but the marking of 'the year the body starts to fall apart'. With some of us going through extreme financial crises during this awful economy, and others having difficulties with jobs, husbands, children, grandchildren, and caring for aged parents; we, at 60, find ourselves in a place we would have never envisioned had we looked ahead to this time back in the care-free days at Lee High. I guess we envisioned that at 60, we'd be kicking back, resting on our laurels and taking it easy.

As the conversations became more and more depressing, Cassie made the decision that it was 'time to laugh', and no one can make us laugh any better than Cassie. She regaled us with a couple of jokes and funny stories, and our troubles melted magically into hilarity.

With the mood lightened enough for us to even acknowledge the reason we had gotten together, Carol seized the upbeat moment to bring out five beautifully decorated pink gift bags, handing one to each of us birthday girls. We opened the bags and found coffee mugs with 60 (and still under construction) printed on them. Heaven only knows that's true. We are still trying to get it right. We also got a black beaded bracelet attached to a card that touted it to be a 'memory bracelet'.

Bettalee (our nickname for Betty Wheat) then said she had gone shopping that day and just couldn't find anything appropriate for our birthday gift, so she had finally decided on 'just a card'....and not EACH a card...ONE card for the five of us that we passed around to read. Of course, we then had to make fun of her for this extravagance. Making fun of each other is common, so being thick-skinned is a must in this group. This also led us to a memory-lane conversation of the decade before when we were MUCH YOUNGER and celebrated our 50th during our week-long beach trip to Destin.

Deb said, "Do y'all remember when Bettalee and Carol dressed up like men and did a dance for us for our fiftieth? That was hilarious."

Katherine (Kak) added, "And remember the birthday cake with all our pictures on it and the t-shirts with our high school boyfriends' pictures on them."

Ginger added, "Yeah, and didn't some of you have the same boyfriend's picture on the back?" Deb said, "Yes, and Vassar could have just had a group picture of all of our old boyfriends on hers, since she dated them all, even WHILE we were dating them." We still give Vassar a hard time for that one, but all in good fun.

"And who could forget Ginger's wonderful majorette performance. That was the best!!!

Not to mention the daily little gifts, like old-lady hairnets, reading glasses and Depends pull-ups....we got a different gift every night. You girls just went all out!!" I recalled.

Cindy chimed in, "I was in a panic the entire week saying to BI, 'Oh my gosh - how in the world are we going to ever top this when they turn 50 next year?'"

I really laughed at that, and said, "She honestly drove me crazy that whole week. Every time y'all would do yet another cool thing for us, she would get more and more upset. She could hardly enjoy the week for the self-imposed pressure of trying to come up with ideas for your birthday AN ENTIRE YEAR AWAY."

Deb said, "Remember, she even made us have a special meeting at Kak's in Birmingham to plan it. We wrote skits and songs, made up a dance, created t-shirts, and came up with daily gift ideas -- we all worked our tails off back then."

I just shook my head and sighed, "Well, look at it this way, girls. At least we don't have a lot to live up to when these wenches turn 60 next year. Heck, we'll be 61 by then, so we can just give them these damn cups back."

And Vassar said, "YES! And let's save these cute pink bags to put them in." Cindy instantly hobbled up on her one good leg grabbing the bags exclaiming, "Great idea, Vassar, I'm going to go put these up right now while I'm thinking about it."

Deb then held up her arm which was adorned with her memory bracelet and dead-panned, "Now WHAT was this for?" I said, "I don't I remember, but they are cute, so we can throw these in the bag with the cups."

Cindy was visibly relieved and said, "Oh I'm just so excited. We have y'all's 60th birthday all planned now, and we won't even have to have a meeting."

Bettalee slumped and pouted, "I think this WAS the meeting. Yay - can't wait for our 'surprise' party next year.

Ginger said, "Hey, cheer up. By this time next year, none of us will even remember this."

"Yeah, and besides, you just gave us a card, so shut up." I added. We can be so kind to each other.

Cassie (the baby, who just turned 58) then said, "Y'all are pitiful. By the time I turn 60, no one will even have the energy left to get me a group card."

Vassar snipped, "That's what you get for being so young. You'll just have to plan your own birthday party. But be sure to remind us, or we'll forget to even show up."

Carol said, "And by then, Cassie, maybe we'll have at least one '60' cup that isn't broken that we can give you for your gift. But forget the memory bracelet. BI's will be lost before she even leaves here, and no one else will remember them."

Those words came back haunt her when a little later in the evening, she was telling a story. She suddenly stopped in the middle of her tale and starting hitting her forehead with her index finger. She said, "Oh shoot, I just can't remember what happened next."

So I asked her if she wanted to borrow my bracelet to help jog her memory.

She paused. "WHAT bracelet?"

I pointed to my wrist and rolled my eyes. "Hello??"

"Oh"

I gave a thumbs-up to my fellow 'oldsters' and said, "I think we are good to go on our plan. Yep, it will definitely be a surprise."

"Yeah, but who is going to remind US what we planned?" Cindy asked.

We all slowly turned and looked at 'the baby'. Cassie shrugged her shoulders and sighed, "Oh, the burdens of being so young."

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