Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: FRIDAY, April 30, 1993 TAG: 9304300246
SECTION: CURRENT PAGE: NRV-1 EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY
SOURCE: RANDY WALKER SPECIAL TO THE ROANOKE TIMES & WORLD-NEWS
DATELINE: SALEM LENGTH: Medium
"She took one sip of milk and just slumped over, and she was gone," Long recalled. "Good way to leave here, I guess."
That was in February 1992. Six months later, Long met an old friend, Pinie Louise McGuire Bond, as both were leaving a Radford funeral home.
Long and Bond had known each other for 55 years. Long, 78, lives in Pulaski County near Radford; Bond, 76, lived in Radford for 20 years before moving to Salem. Bond and Blanche Long went to first grade together.
After Bond married Robert Bond, the two couples saw a lot of each other. They visited each other's home; Long worked on the Bonds' car at his Radford garage.
Robert Bond died in 1988, after suffering from Alzheimer's disease for 11 years.
Although Everett Long and Pinie Bond had known each other for a half-century, they "never hardly looked at one another" until that day in the funeral-home parking lot, Long said.
She said, "Have you had anything to eat?"
He said, "No."
She said, "Let's go across the river."
They crossed the New River to the fast-food strip and ate fish sandwiches at McDonald's. Afterward, they returned to the funeral home and sat in the car, talking.
"My cousin pulled up and made great big eyes and said, `I don't believe it,' " Bond recalled in an interview at her house in Salem.
"I said, `Well, it's so anyway.' "
From that day on, Long and Bond went steady. Long would stop at Bond's house for lunch or dinner whenever he came to Roanoke. Retired from his mechanic's job at H.T. Bowling, Long still makes deliveries for the Radford company on a part-time basis.
A couple of months after meeting in the parking lot, Long proposed while sitting on Bond's couch.
The match pleased Bond's son, Robert Bond Jr., who has known Long all his life. It also pleased Bond's friends at Faith Assembly of God in Salem.
"We've had a ball with the wedding," Bond said. "I told 'em we didn't need nothing but they gave us a lingerie shower down at the church."
"I don't need nothing, not even drinking liquor," Long put in.
Bond received perfume, towels and flowers - as well as certain other items.
"I'd be ashamed to tell you everything I got," she said. "If I show it to you, will you not write about it? No, I guess you will."
On April 17, Everett Long and Pinie Bond were married at Faith Assembly of God. The bride wore an off-white suit with a touch of blue and pink in the jacket, and a headpiece of flowers and lace.
She held a white Bible decorated with orchids and pink ribbon. She was given away by her son, and her daughter-in-law, Barbara Bond, was the maid of honor.
Long and Bond were the oldest couple ever married by Pastor Herley Shortt. "Almost old enough to get married," Long joked.
There was no immediate honeymoon but the Monday after the wedding, movers came to take Bond's possessions to Radford, where she will live with Long.
"They say the first thing you buy your wife is an ax," Long said, giggling. "So she can cut the wood," Bond explained.
Actually, Bond will do house work and work with flowers. "I'd love to work yet, but my legs give out on me," said Bond, who is retired from registered nursing at Roanoke Memorial Hospitals, McVitty House and private duty.
Both have plenty of experience with married life - she was married for 50 years, he for 54 - and expect to find life together agreeable. "We've done knowed each other for so long, we look forward to being together the rest of our lives," she said. "We don't believe in divorce. We're going to hang together. Yes, I think we'll be fine."
by CNB