By KATIE DE VERTEUIL
A VISIT to see the Queen, a mutual passion for dance and a problematic cyclone – the love-story of Cooroy’s Ray and Patricia Britten is more exciting than most fairytales.
The delightful couple celebrated their 60th wedding anniversary last Saturday, and reminiscing of the years that have passed, there certainly is plenty to their romance.
At 11am on 9 April 1955, Patricia then 21 and Ray 22 professed their love for each other in Yandina Methodist Church among 120 family members and friends.
It was, however, lucky that the ceremony even took place, a cyclone having ripped through the small town.
“A cyclone had just come through the town the day before and almost blown the church down,” Patricia said.
“There were holes in the organ and the boys had to straighten parts of the building.
“Corn bags were laid down on the ground so that my dress wouldn’t get muddy.”
“We thought the rain might’ve been a bad omen, but 60 years on, I’m thinking it was otherwise,” she added quite amazed at how quickly time has flown.
The cleanliness of Patricia’s elegant gown was however not the only concern of the day with a last-minute rush to find frangipanis for the bride’s bouquet having become top priority for her groom.
“I really wanted three frangipanis in my bouquet but with the storm it was almost impossible to find any,” Patricia said.
“I managed to track down the only three left in the town,” Ray continued.
“I remember having to stand on a car in the yard behind the butcher and post office to reach them from the tree.”
A mechanic and devoted volunteer with the local firies, Ray met Patricia a year earlier.
Patricia, a nurse at Nambour hospital at the time, had joined Ray and a number of others from the area in travelling to Brisbane to see the Queen when she had come to visit.
“There was a group of us from around who headed down on the back of two ‘Morrises’ for the occasion,” Ray said.
“That was back at a time when there were no seat belts, so we all piled in,” Patricia added.
Discovering in each other a mutual passion for dancing, Patricia and Ray continued seeing each other at local balls across the district.
While for Patricia it was Ray’s fireman uniform and “nice legs” that first sparked attraction, for Ray it was less specific.
“I guess we just clicked,” he said.
“You don’t really think of it at the time.”
Sixty years on, the couple happily reside in their Cooroy house and are parents of two, grandparents to six and great grandparents of two.
When asked for the secret to wedded bliss, both Ray and Patricia see eye to eye.
“Always talk things through,” Ray said.
“And don’t give up,” Patricia added.
“We’ve had our arguments, but we don’t pack up our ports and head for the hills like most young people seem to do these days.
“Marriage is about taking the good with the bad.”
