The Sweetheart Seranade

Every year that we were in Minnesota a large church in Plymouth MN had what they called "The Valentine Gala". They would have a very nice candlelight dinner with hundreds of people dining, then go to their worship center for a big concert by a well-known Gospel singer. The first year they had Steve and Annie Chapman. Every year it was another musician -- and we loved it. Even though the menu was exactly the same every year, we still loved the special evening.

This was our first February in Texas and we wondered what kind of activities would be going on here. We checked with many of the churches and found no one having anything special going on, so I checked the Denton newspaper and saw a "Sweetheart Serenade" taking place on Saturday night. The feature was big band music played by the Denton Community Orchestra -- Glenn Miller style -- and Debbie loves that music, so I made the reservation.

The program was at the Denton Civic Center, so we figured it would be pretty tame and something we could enjoy. We got there and the first thing we found was that we were one of the youngest couples there. I haven't been to a dance since my senior prom over 40+ years ago. They had a dance floor setup so folks could dance to the big band music. No, don't worry, we didn't. It looked like a lot of fun but neither of us could remember how, so we just watched.

I have to tell you that it was really sweet watching some very elderly couples out on the dance floor having a wonderful time, holding their sweetie close. One couple looked like they were just able to move around a little bit and most of the time only lasted half the song. But to watch these folks, all in their 70's, 80's or maybe even more, having such a sweet time with each other.

It was a community orchestra, not a professional group of musicians, but they played all the oldies for 3 hours. It was really a delightful evening to spend with my God-given Valentine!