When my daughter and her boy friend made up their minds to get married, they started immediately looking for a place to live. No such forethought went into the planning of our future for Evan and me. After a short honeymoon, we hit the streets of Jackson, Mississippi on the hottest day of the year, armed with the daily paper, a city map, and a bag of ice to help us survive it.

All of our possessions  were stacked in the trunk and back seat of our`55 Buick Special. It was so special it had no heater, no air-conditioner, no radio and no clock. What it did have was room. They made them big in those days. Our possessions consisted of our clothes, sheets, towels, dishes, and kitchenware, which we got for wedding gifts. In addition, we did have food.

My mother saw to it that we had enough food with us to keep us alive for several weeks. Unfortunately, we had no means of keeping the food fit for human consumption that long. I was Mama's only offspring, and I was leaving the nest for the first time. This might have accounted for the large "care package", or possibly, she suspected we might be running low on cash before my new husband drew his next paycheck. Still, I doubt if she could have guessed how low.

Two major factors limited our options in our search for our dream apartment. The first requirement was it had to be furnished, because the largest item either of us owned was a radio.  The second was it had to be cheap. We had no idea what apartments rented for, but we'd hoped to find something for around $50.00 per month. These days that sounds like the price of a meal for two at a decent restaurant, but this was 1956, and in our section of the world low rent was still possible, or almost.

We hit the streets early, because we wanted to be settled before nightfall. We couldn't afford for more of our rapidly depleting funds to go toward renting a motel room. As it turned out, there weren’t many furnished places to choose from within our price range. In fact, most of the ones we found were either in unsuitable areas, or had already been rented. The heat was oppressive, and our nerves were frayed. The bag of ice, which we'd bought to cool us down, had almost melted, and we were starting to wonder if being married was worth the trouble.

We were about to give up for the day, when we noticed a lady out in the front yard of a nice older home tacking up a sign which read "Furnished Apartment For Rent."  We inquired, and she said we were in luck. Just that morning, her boarders, a couple of single girls, had moved out. The apartment was a little three-room cottage behind the big house. She hadn't had a chance to clean it yet, but if we'd give her a couple of hours, we could have it for $50 per month. It was exactly what we had in mind, and we could be in it by sundown. Things were definitely looking up.

That evening, we moved in. We spread a cloth on the table and pulled out the care package from home, packed with soggy, day-old sandwiches, stale crumbling chips, and tepid punch. For dessert, there was wedding cake. The heat had melted the icing, and the cake itself was starting to have a funky taste, but it was our first meal in our new apartment, and we were happy.

As we ate, it grew darker. From the woodwork, came roaches to share our evening spread. They came by the hundreds. Having never lived in the city before, this was my first experience with the loathsome creatures. I was horrified. This was totally unacceptable, but still I wasn't willing to give up on our little cottage just yet. Surely, there was something we could do.

What we did was proceed to the nearest supermarket and buy everything in the pest-control section with the picture of a roach on it. When we returned to the apartment, we wound towels around our faces and proceeded to fumigate. By the time we had emptied our cans, there wasn't a roach to be seen anywhere. Neither was there any air to be breathed. We exited sputtering, coughing and gasping for oxygen. We figured the air should be safe for breathing within four hours, so we got into our car and went to a double-feature, drive-in theater.

It was well after midnight when we returned. Other than a few dead ones on the floor, the roaches appeared to be gone. The apartment was still polluted, but we opened the windows and fanned in fresh air.  Eventually we decided that survival was possible. It had been a long day, and we figured we'd have no problem sleeping. We made the bed with fresh sheets, turned off the lights and fell into bed, exhausted.

Earlier, we had only partially unpacked, and newspapers were scattered about the room.  We planned to take care of those in the morning. Now, the papers started to rattle. There was a sound of movement everywhere. Suddenly something fell from the ceiling onto my face. I screamed and bolted out of bed. Evan bounced up beside me and hit the light switch. The ceiling was covered with dying roaches, hanging by two legs and falling to the floor, the bed, and everywhere. It was a nightmare. We grabbed our clothes and fled.

At two in the morning, we found a hotel with vacancies and checked in. I had a good cry, and then we both cracked up laughing. The next morning we went back to the apartment and moved out. The lady apologized and gave our deposit back. She was probably grateful to us, because I have a feeling, we took care of her roach problem.

What a way to begin our life together; broke, homeless, and not knowing what our next move would be. Yet we were young, and it was an adventure. We knew as long as we could still laugh, we would probably be able to handle whatever circumstances came our way.  Why take the fun out of it by planning ahead?