Thanks, Mr. Terry
By Susan Law
Corpany
Many moons ago, in the
late 1960s, Mr. Eugene Terry, my junior high school
chorus teacher, gave a test to all the students in his
music classes. He required us to write from memory
all the verses of America, the Beautiful and
our national anthem, The Star-Spangled Banner. It
was not an ordinary test where you turned it in and
got a grade and that was the end of it. We had to take
the test over and over again until we got it perfect,
down to the last word.
The assignment didn’t fill
me with dread the way it apparently did some of the
other students. I much preferred it to the times he
would randomly point at one of us to do a solo line
from the current song we were learning. When the “fickle
finger of fate” would point at me, I would squeak out
a few notes, self-consciously wishing all the musical
talent in the family had not been apportioned out unfairly
to my brothers.
From my point of view,
the blank white sheet of paper he handed out that first
day was not nearly as daunting, and I contemplated the
words of those anthems to our country as I committed
them to memory. Words have always had the power to
stir me, perhaps because I am a writer. (Actually,
I think that works the other way around.)
I don’t remember how many
times it took me to get it perfect.
I don’t really remember
if I finished it sooner than most of my fellow students.
I do remember that there
was lots of moaning and groaning each week when the
papers were handed back.
“I can’t believe he’s making
me take it over for only missing three words!”
“I am so sick of these
songs!”
“Who cares if it is ‘purple
mountains majesties’ or ‘purple mountain majesties’?”
And there is one other
thing I have always remembered — the words.
Fast forward to the year
2000 — the 4th of July. Long out of junior
high school, I was a single 45-year-old woman waiting
in a small park not far from Temple Square in Salt Lake
City, a park where Brigham Young is buried, for an in-person
meeting with a man with whom my contact so far had been
limited to cyberspace. At the time, he lived in Hawaii
and I lived in Florida.
When I had first begun
to trade e-mails with him, I had imagined that because
of the distance, I would likely never meet this widowed
college professor with whom I seemed to have a lot in
common, besides sharing the unfortunate circumstance
of also having lost a spouse. However, we were both
vacationing in Utah that July, and with a little tweaking
of schedules, we had the opportunity to meet in person.
It was a Sunday. I was
wearing “the dress” — you know, the one that when I
wore it, everyone would tell me those were my colors,
and which always gave me an added sense of confidence.
My hair and make-up had been attended to with a little
more care that day as well. And in the pit of my stomach
I had that same feeling as years ago when Mr. Terry
would point at me for a solo.
When Thom arrived, I discarded
all my rehearsed clever opening remarks and went with
“Hi” in response to his equally eloquent “Hi there.”
We managed to muddle through those first few awkward
moments and sat and chatted on a bench for a few minutes.
He suggested we walk over to the Temple Square where
the Tabernacle Choir was doing a patriotic broadcast.
After enjoying stirring renditions of many of our patriotic
anthems, we attended church in the ward that meets in
the Joseph Smith Memorial Building.
As we stood to sing the
national anthem, I did not need to grasp the other side
of the hymn book he was holding, thanks to that assignment
long ago. I might not have been able to hit all the
high notes, but I knew the words. Tears often come
unbidden to my eyes when I sing it. To me, it is a
hymn of praise as much as any other song in the book.
And this be our motto:
“In God is our trust!”
The words were there, as
they always have been since the 9th grade.
(By the way, I understand that Mr. Terry now works in
the Salt Lake Temple, so if anyone reading this knows
him, please print it out and give him a copy. Thanks!)
It was a patriotic date
from start to finish. That evening the two of us parked
on the hill overlooking the city behind the capitol
building and watched fireworks throughout the valley.
I contemplated that I was going to be able to tell our
grandchildren that I saw fireworks the first time he
kissed me. (Only I can’t because he didn’t. He saved
that for his best friend’s garage, where instead I saw
yard tools and food storage.)
Fast forward again to May
of 2001. Some time after admiring the engagement ring
he had just slipped on my finger on a ferry boat in
Seattle, I had to ask. “So I’ve always been curious,
after our first meeting, what your first impressions
were, what it was that made you think I might be a keeper.”
I waited for him to tell me about my fun personality,
my wonderful sense of humor, my aura of spirituality,
my stunning good looks, or possibly his awestruck appreciation
of the total package.
Without a moment’s hesitation,
he said, “You knew all the words to all the verses of
the national anthem.”
“That’s not very romantic,
but I’m glad you noticed.”
He returned the question.
“So what impressed you that day?”
“That you were from out
of town but you still knew the best make-out spot in
Salt Lake City.”
If I had ever contemplated
what impact learning the words to those songs might
have had on my future (and being a teen-ager, I doubt
I did), I don’t think I would have ever imagined it
would further my social life.
Thom and I have been married
now for over five years, a tenth of the way to our Golden
Wedding Anniversary. The 4th of July is
doubly special to us now — an anniversary for both us
and the country we love. Whenever we sing along at
a sporting event, stand with hand over heart at a parade
as a marching band plays our national anthem or rise
to our feet in a July sacrament meeting, he will always
lean over and whisper in my ear, “They’re playing our
song.”
