It did not start like the picture above. Instead, picture this in your mind. It is mid December, 1979 in Savannah, GA. It is hot. It’s humid. A group of my high school friends and I had gathered together to play football like you do when one of your friends returns from college. We are all sweaty and bleeding from being pushed into the azalea bushes. We are definitely in our most unattractive state. Lori and Eileen show up uninvited. Lori is persona non grata due to her previous attempts to set me up on dates in The Teenage Years.
I have a chance to chat with Eileen and the brief conversation was worthy of follow-up so I ask her out for New Year’s Eve. She says yes and the courtship of Eileen has begun. She is a high school senior and I am a college freshman.
I showed up at Eileen’s house for our first date as the grandfather clock tolls 7. I can carry on a conversation with her parents on the topics of the day so they are comfortable with the date. We promised to be back shortly after midnight and we head out.
We head over to my friend David Rubnitz‘s parent’s house and we continued to immediately connect. We play pool, laugh at others playing pool, watch the young comedians on HBO, and enjoyed each other’s company. It is a first date so there is no kiss at midnight and we continue to have a good time. At some point the phone rings. David walks over and tells Eileen the phone is for her. She is puzzled but goes to the phone and conversation goes something like this:
“Hi dad!” (pause while dad talks)
“We had no idea. We will be right home.”
Eileen (Schreck) Carver, 1 Jan 1980
It was 4:20 AM. Just like Little Suzie, we had lost track of time. Eileen’s dad had called every Rubnitz in the Savannah telephone book to find us. We hurried out and I dropped Eileen off. I asked her for her telephone number for a 2nd date and she readily agreed.
Over the next 11 days, we are inseparable. It does not matter what the event is as long as we are together. At this point, another telephone call takes place. The conversation goes like this:
“Hello. Hello. Hello”
(Eileen’s mom, Curt’s mom, and I. This will not go well for me)
“Curt, you must come home. It is 5AM and your plane leaves in two hours. You have not packed.“
(Curt’s mom)
“Curt, where are you?“
(Eileen’s mom)
“The kitchen.“
(Curt)
“You will not be there long.“
(Eileen’s mom)
Out the front door I go to catch a plane. I make it. For the next six months we write a lot of letters back and forth (email did not exist). Once a week, I got in a line and waited for a telephone booth. I would call my parent’s house and they would pass the phone around so everyone could talk with me. Eventually, the ladies and guys waiting in line would make it clear that my time was up in the telephone booth.
On Eileen’s side, she would go to church with her parents and then come over and have breakfast with my parents. They would then sit around waiting for me to call. As she has quibbled, she dated my family as much as she dated me.
I had about three weeks off over the summer of 1980 and we again were inseparable. We went to see Star Wars, Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back. We went to watch Corey play soccer. Candidly, it did not matter as long as we were together. This was infinitely different than every other girl I had dated. We just clicked. Kissing was now definitely on the table and our nightly farewells were epic. On my last night in town at my parent’s house in June 1980, I was walking her out to the car to drive her home. As soon as we left the house, she started crying and at that moment, I was in love and I would do almost anything to stop her from crying. She professes that despite the crying, it took her a bit longer to fall in love.
The cycle continued. Lots of letters. Lots of weekly breakfasts with my family and then telephone calls. Eileen is now a freshman at Georgia. I invite her to Yearling Winter Weekend and told her to bring her formal dress. She invited me to a college sorority party. We grew closer together and spent every moment we could together.
Hurricanes, Jugglers, and the Sugar Bowl
After two years of dating, Eileen somehow convinced her parents that it was a good idea for her and I to go to New Orleans and the Sugar Bowl on Jan 1, 1982. I really don’t know how she did it but I thought it was a splendid idea.
We flew down on a plane filled with Georgia fans. We were joined by one guy, and four of Eileen’s sorority sisters. Together, we set about exploring New Orleans and sharing a single hotel room. Part of that exploration was the legendary Pat O’Brien’s where we were introduced to hurricanes. Eileen liked hurricanes so much that she decided afterwards that she would take a multi decade break from the drink. Part of that exploration was a nice French restaurant that featured (a) a Maître d who really did not want us to enter the restaurant but we won that discussion and, (b) really good food and especially their French Onion Soup.
We were in the stadium but just barely. We were so high in the seats that there was a chance of altitude sickness. #2 Georgia was playing #8 Pittsburgh with a battle between Hershel Walker and Dan Marino leading to a very close game. Ultimately, Dan Marino made an amazing pass late in the 4th quarter and Pittsburgh won the game.
Part of that engagement was enjoying all the street acts. One of Eileen’s sorority sisters really liked two young, attractive Canadian jugglers who were about our age. She liked them so much that she invited them to come sleep in out hotel room on the floor (they had no where to sleep). This was not a popular decision with the other two sorority sisters who spent part of the evening hiding all their jewelry. We were leaving at 4 AM so the jugglers needed to leave as well. The be smitten sorority sister asked the jugglers to perform one last time and at 4 AM in the hallway of the hotel, the sleep deprived jugglers created our last memory of New Orleans.
I returned to West Point and Eileen to the University of Georgia but our time apart would be short. Eileen came up to join me for 500th Night in late January and flew into LaGuardia airport. My friend Jim Lee drove me down to get her and as soon as Eileen got in the car, she proceeded, without breathing, to catch me up on all that had happened in her life in the last three weeks in an animated, energetic nonstop monologue that went 90 minutes. As Eileen rushed into Hotel Thayer to quickly change into her gown, Jim asked with mental exhaustion if she was always like that. I replied no – she was just really happy to see me. I was really happy to see her.
The Proposal
The cycle continued. By May 1982, I felt it was time to propose to Eileen. Eileen had gently probed with my mom about engagement but my mom lied and told her I did not have the money for a ring. I had saved my meager cadet salary for eight months for an engagement ring and the plan was to propose on Christmas Eve 1982. The plan had the following components:
- Gain permission of her father at their Christmas Eve family party to propose;
- Secure the Carver living room which had the advantage of being seldom used and the disadvantage of having formal red furniture;
- Talk Eileen into opening her “Christmas” gift early. The gift was a box within a box within a box with towels, soap, alarm clocks and other random items; and,
- When she asked what this was, tell her it was a distraction and the real gift was an engagement ring at which point I would propose.
The plan failed spectacularly at every step. Eileen was glued to me for the entire Christmas Eve party and set world speed records in rest room use. I did not get a chance to ask her father.
She was puzzled that we were in the seldom used room and not with the rest of the family. We had an extended conversation that we would never have red furniture.
Talking Eileen into opening her gift early took longer than expected and my sister Kym walked in to ask if I was done yet. I shushed her out and Eileen was oblivious.
When she finally opened the gift, she was really baffled and weakly asked if I was trying to make a comment on her hygiene. That was unexpected.
Without missing a beat, I responded that no silly, I was trying to give her an engagement ring and slipped the ring onto her finger. The surprise was complete. In fact, it was so complete that she collapsed into my lap.
Several minutes later, I was still waiting for her to recover and gently prompted her that a marriage proposal is normally followed by a yes or no. I received a weak yes. She recovered quickly after this point and spent about equal time kissing me and admiring how her ring looked.
At some point, a large extended Carver family came in and congratulated the new couple. We went to Midnight mass at Nativity, told our pastor and family friend Father O’Brien, and I took her home. The next morning, her mother asked if I had got her a sweater for Christmas (such a trendy gift for lovers) and Eileen had the pleasure of flashing her engagement ring. I was a bit hesitant when I came over to her house the next day as I did not know how her parents would react to me proposing without asking. They were very gracious.
Eloquent Letters of Unbridled Anger
The ring was slightly too large which made it perfect for slipping on but not so perfect for wearing all the time. While the ring was being resized, she told her sorority sisters that I had given her a sweater for Christmas (really, it is a trendy gift for lovers). It seems that her 150 sorority sisters did not think it was an appropriate and trendy gift and thus they decided as a harem to write me long, articulate, eloquent letters expressing their extreme displeasure. Their use of profanity was truly creative and impressive. Now, I had been dating Eileen for a while and knew most of her sorority sisters. I read with much amusement the letters back at West Point.
In Georgia, once the ring was resized, it was time for the sorority candle pass ceremony. For those unfamiliar with this very female ceremony, The 150 ladies in the sorority form a large circle with a lit candle. The candle goes around the circle and if it is blown out by a lady on the first pass, she had been pinned. If the candle is blown out on the second pass, she had been lavaliered and if the candle is blown out on the third pass, she was engaged. There is no male equivalent of this ceremony.
Eileen told her sorority big sister and one of her roommates and they staged themselves a couple of positions on either side of Eileen in the circle. The ceremony starts:
- The candle went around once and nothing happened. The tension builds.
- The candle goes around 150 girls a second time and nothing happened. It is an engagement. Someone is getting married. The tension in the circle moves beyond palatable to what the Scottish would call a female fresh gale (a hurricane cat 1).
- As the candle approaches Eileen, everyone collectively holds their breath but it passes her. The candle goes three more ladies down and reverses course. The collective tension in the room moves to female hurricane cat 5. It passes Eileen again and goes three more ladies down before it reverses course one last time. We are now in uncharted territory as far was female tension and pinned up hysteria goes. Scientific experiments to model such female tension destroy continents. The candle passes back to Eileen who blows out the candle and is immediately mobbed.
A side effect of this ceremony was collective amnesia. All of the ladies who wrote me letters of unbridled anger seem to have forgotten the letters. I still have them after all these years. With the engagement, the courtship of Eileen came to a happy conclusion. It is now time to discuss between engagement and marriage with a series of five humorous stories. To learn more, visit the aptly named Between Engagement and Marriage.