So, I stayed there and then I made the mistake of getting married. I got married the same year that I got out. I got married in November 1952. I got discharged on Labor Day weekend 1952.

I met her – she was my neighbor. She was a lot younger than I was and I felt sorry for her the way her mom used to treat her, always banging on her head, and I used to hate that. I don’t like people to hit people on the head because it really screws up your mind. Maybe that’s why she married me? I don’t know. So I’d known her all these times and when I went overseas I had asked her very nicely – I don’t know, I wasn’t even in love then – if she wanted to get married and she says, “No. You are the last person in the world I would marry.” Her name is Annie Adamay, but I called her Annie.

Anyway, I asked her again when I got back. She says, “Phil, just take me out to dinner. I’ll never marry you.” She told the truth. Then in November her and her mother got into a big hassle and her father; poor guy, he was scared of his wife so naturally he never stood up for the kids.

So, she asked me, she says, “Does the offer still go?”
I said, “What offer?”

She says, “You wanted to marry me?”

I says, “Sure.” And that’s the end of my love life. She was quite a gal.

Oh, a lot of crazy things happened to us after we were married. Some guy tried to kidnap her in town (Laughs), and I fought with the cops because I wanted to kill the guy and they wouldn’t let me do it. He had his rights. I didn’t have any rights, but he had his rights. Yep!

I blame the tannery for this. Every anniversary I always bought her a gift, but I couldn’t make it that night because I was working late at the tannery. So, I told her, I said, “Go down and buy what you want and don’t worry about it.”

The stores I went to they gave me credit anyplace I wanted to go.

I says, “Whatever you need just go ahead and get it.” So, she did and I got off work about quarter to nine that night. I went down to the club where I usually hang out and I said, “I’ll meet you down there.”

Well, I got there and she’s not there. I wait and I wait and I’m getting panicked. Something must have gone wrong. Sure enough, something did go wrong. So I says, “Well, somebody wait around and give me a call if something happens.”

So, just as I was ready to leave the phone rings and it was her calling me; she was in jail. She was in jail for what?! “I’ll tell you when I see you.” (Laughs) She was crying and I started crying with her, you know?

So, I turn off down to the police station to get her and I asked her, “My wife?”

She says, “You wait your turn!”

I said, “I don’t give a damn what you say she’s my wife!”

They knew me so they says, “Phil, keep it up and you’ll be thrown in jail.”

I said, “You guys are a bunch of assholes!” That’s the law…he’s got the rights too, you know. So, I didn’t get the chance to see the guy, that night anyway.

I got her home and she was telling me about it. Then I started jumping on her. I says, “I keep telling you! When you get in your goddamned car lock the damn doors! Especially in town! This town has changed!”

The good old times…you know? So, anyway, after _______ and every damn thing, the guy come to her and she’s jumping in her car and he asked her what time it was and she says, “It’s 8:15.”

The guy said, “Good. Move over.”

She says, “What do you mean move over?” He says, “I want you to take me someplace.”

She says, “No.”

He says, “Move over I’m driving.” She was a tough woman, she was (Laughs). She says, “I’ll take you anyplace you want. Just don’t hurt me I have five kids!” and a big sob story.

At that time I had a ’68 Volkswagen Coupe, bug rather. She was driving it. That was her car. So she tells the guy to get in the backseat. The guy gets in the backseat and she pushes the seat back and locked it. She took off running to the store and tripped a couple times. By that time she was hollering, “Call the cops! Call the cops!” There was an off-duty policeman coming out of the store so they ran and they tackled the guy and finally got the guy and got him to jail.

When we got to talking that night I says, “I told you time and time again. You get in the car you lock the goddamned door and you are inside. Don’t be out there bullshitting at every jackass there is!” Anyway, it happened, but she was pretty smart.

My wife had problems with her monthly period and the doctor says, “Since you married a jackass,” doctors like me too, he says, “By having a kid it usually solves this problem,” which it did. So, naturally we had a kid pretty early.