MOM'S WIT
by Janet H. Brown

Romance is wonderful - ask any woman who is in love or who is still in love. The most romantic story I can think of at this time - especially with Valentine's Day around the corner - is how my mother met my father.

In 1949, my father was in the Army stationed in Yokohama, Japan. He was a sergeant in the Engineering Core. My father saw my mother for the first time playing tennis at her college and wanted to meet her. He followed her to her sister's fiancee's dance school. G.I.'s were discouraged and at times were not permitted to go into all Japanese establishments meant for the Japanese public only.

This did not seem to stop my father, my mother was there with her sister. He asked her to dance and she was attracted to the 6' tall, good looking soldier, and couldn't refuse him. My mother was invited to go to her first American birthday party for a friend of my father, and for the very first time she ate a piece of birthday cake. She remembers the cake and said it was delicious. My father continued to see my mother under the scrutinizing eye of the Army.

The Army had their regulations, they tried to discourage soldiers from falling in love with Japanese girls. They knew it would be a hardship for both parties, especially after the war.

My father was transferred three different times from Yokohama and each time he would ask to go back. My mother's parents did not want her to fall in love with the American G.I. and locked her in the house forbidding her to see him. Her sister came home in the evening and told her that my father was looking for her. She gathered her things and, with her sister's help, crept out of the house to find him. It was a dark and rainy night and my mother said that it seemed as if she were searching for him all night. She had almost given up hope when she happened to see a tall, dark figure walking toward her from the other side of the street. It was my father. They had found each other in the rain and never again were they separated.

My parents were married in Japan in 1950. My mother never regrets falling in love with the tall, good looking American G.I.