Zoo Time

"With all my heart and soul."

"Yes, Yes I will marry you, anytime, anywhere, just name it." I stood and kissed her hungrily. I pulled back, "Maybe tomorrow. Let's go talk to Dad, Goldie come on."

The whole crowd followed us to where Dad and Tag and others were sitting. I told everyone about Tag's invitation. Dad grinned, "Tag, how many people can you put up for a wedding party?" Tag looked at Mackie and when she came to him they talked softly together. "About twenty four in comfort if we use the houseboat. Not counting the Bride and Groom."

Dad looked around, "How many can we fly down to the Keys." Buck's Dad said six. My dad said eight, Tag said four. Buck said six. Dad said, "Perfect, how many want to go?"

Dad looked at everyone, "Just a second, I love Tag for his offer, but doesn't it make more sense to fly Bill, the Preacher and his wife Mary up here. We can throw a wedding together damned quick right over at my place. Most of you live nearby and I can put up half a dozen of you at my place.

Everyone looked at each other. Dad asked Tag to call and see if Bill and Mary were willing and available. Tag pulled out a cell phone and walked off talking on it. Everyone waited until he walked back grinning.

"Everything is taken care of. These two will be married tomorrow, if the Lord is willin'." Tag explained that Bill and his wife would be flown to the Ocala Airport in the morning in Mackie's Learjet. Someone could meet them and fly or drive them to our place.

I looked at my bride to be, "I think you need to call your folks right now. They can come for dinner tonight and spend the night if they want."

Angela looked a little stunned. "Is all this going too fast for you Baby Girl? Do we need to slow down? I know this is really fast. I am just scared to death you will somehow change your mind, then what would I do?"

"No, no, I am so happy! I am just thinking of what to wear. What I need to do. Let me call my folks right now. This will be a shock for them."

I handed her my cell phone. She punched in the numbers and when someone answered she asked mom to get her dad on the line too. She explained what was going on. She looked startled. "What?" She smiled, "They thought we would already be married by now. They are going to pack everything Mom thinks I will need and bring it out to your Dad's place later. Can you give my father directions?"

I told her father how to get to our home. He said He thought he knew the place.

I told everyone that Angela and I were going to take the little jet home and that we would see them later. I got my lady all strapped in the seat and helped her with the helmet. When it was all secure and she was all plugged in I got in the other side. I started the two jets and taxied out. I made a call on Unicom and announced our departure.

I turned on the end of the strip and poured the coal to her. We were airborne half way down the strip. I raised the gear and stayed low and did a hard 270 degree turn to the left then rolled 180 degrees back to the right and turned 90 degrees and leveled the wings. We were moving pretty good now. I glanced at Angie, "You OK?"

"Woopee! I love it!"

We zipped past the planes on the ground and I sucked back on the stick in a five G pull up and when we were vertical I slapped the stick to the left side of the cockpit and we rolled rapidly going straight up. When the airspeed bled off I stopped the roll and leveled off. I looked at Angela and loved it when she grinned back at me, "Do it again, please, I love it."

I made a wide sweeping turn and lined up with the strip. I reduced power and dropped the gear and flaps I descended as if we were landing. When we crossed the end of the strip I added a bit of power as I rolled us inverted. We flew the length of the strip up side down, then I rolled over and headed home. We cruised along at low altitude until I turned in on our approach to Pop's strip. We touched down and taxied to the hanger. I opened the canopies and hurried to get Angela out after being sure she had properly safetyd the ejection seat like I had taught her. She was grinning from ear to ear. She hugged me and said, "Wow! That was fun. You are really fun to be with. Never a dull moment." She helped me get the bird back in the hanger. We were walking to the golf cart when two SNJs roared down our strip in tight formation. They circled around and came over the field and the first plane broke hard to the left while the second plane continued straight ahead for a few seconds then made his turn follow the first plane. They swept around in a hard turn, one following the other. The first one touched down and taxied over to our tie down area. Number two was right behind them. They parked and shut down. We walked over and were surprised when the pilot of the first plane turned out to be Lucy. She waved and climbed down followed by her husband Buck from the back seat. The second plane was flown by Buck's dad Fred, his lady Jessie rode in back. Another plane was heard in the distance. It was in fact two planes, the Goose with a Lake amphibian flying wing on it. They landed and the party was transferred to the Stewart ranch. They all moved to the pool and patio area. Hiro had been warned and he had a bar set up and hors d'oeuvres' were ready.

I was proud of how lovely Dad's place looked. Angela couldn't believe Hiro and Anna were able to be ready so fast. She even asked Anna if she could help. Anna hugged her and said everything was under control and that she was the Bride and she was just supposed to stand around holding the Groom's hand. That plan sounded good to me. I didn't plan on letting Angie out of my sight before the wedding.

Angie's folks found the place with no problem. We unloaded Angela's things into our suite. I tried on my lightweight navy blue suit and Angela approved of the way I looked. She wouldn't let me see what she was going to wear. At one point we just stood and held each other and calmed down. I told her the only people we had to please was ourselves, and that I was already very pleased with her in every possible way.

Dinner was perfect, how Anna and Hiro did it was beyond us. They did have some extra people helping them, but getting every thing ready for a wedding, plus feeding all the extra people was a real challenge.

I don't know how everything was managed but we stood before Tag's friend, Preacher Bill right on time. Angela was beautiful in a little white suit, hat, shoes and gloves were all white. I couldn't take my eyes off of her.

Dad had given me my Mom's wedding ring to slip on her finger. When it was over I took her in my arms and told her I couldn't believe how lucky I was and that she had really married me. She kissed me hard and said, no, she was the lucky one. Thus we had our first argument before the vows had cleared the air. We held hands and prayed that it would be our last disagreement.