"Poor people have poor ways and plenty of them," Ethel said to Chester as she watched him load the last wooden chair on the back of the truck. He smiled back to her without saying a word. These were hard times, but there had been times far more worse. As for good times there were plenty, and yes, poor, but plenty. But isn't that what is meant when we say our vows? For richer, for poorer, through good times and bad times.
::
An early spring had set in this year. God never lets us be tested beyond what we can bear. It was the last day of March, 1937. It was a lovely day, Chester said to Ethel Lovely Nicholas, "I promise you, sweetheart, we'll have another house again one day." Due to developing deafness in one ear Chester had been asked to take an early retirement from the railroad and they had to move from their ten room house into a three room house in Barboursville, West Virginia, not far from the Guyandotte River which runs into the Ohio River not many miles east of Huntington. The rivers had finally receded after the worst flood to have touched the Ohio Valley in over 100 years. Folks were having a hard enough time as it was since the depression had started and now with the flood it didn't seem like it ought to be spring. But with the receding waters change was in the air. Something had to change and for the better.
::
Ethel seemed hopeful, along with the break in the weather her water broke. She yelled for Ray to put some water on to boil and she made her way to the bedroom. Ray had no idea at all Mother was with child and as stunned as he was hurried to the kitchen to fumble with the kettles. Chester sent for the doctor and then bent down on his knees and began praying. Although he had been through this eleven times before, he knew Ethel's strong, but delicate, stature needed a higher source to get her through the delivery. She had thought her child-carrying days had ended, except for this child, so she made her way and as the evening fell along, God gave her another beautiful baby girl, making it an even six boys and six girls.
::
Ethel looked at her new baby girl in miraculous amazement. She had always hoped one of her children would have blue eyes like her father's eyes and so, on this day, March 31, 1937, a blue-eyed miracle entered their life. Chester had the name Betty picked out since conception if it was a girl, but now, after seeing their baby, Chester and Ethel, both, agreed that they name her Shirley, after Shirley Temple, the actress. Prophetically, without knowing it, whatsoever, they set the life of Shirley Ann Nicholas in motion. Only time would tell if it would include motion pictures.
