Billie Jean

I got an email from Johnny Pascoe, Billie Jean's ex-husband, saying there would be no funeral or memorial service for her.

I did not know she had died.  I heard a year or so ago she was having a serious bout with cancer and I haven't heard about it anymore.

Even though there will be no funeral or memorial service I would like to say a few words about her as I remember her.

Back in 1962 and 1963 I worked with a girl named Sue (nothing like a boy named Sue) at Eastman Atlantic Mfg Co on Chattahoochee Blvd in Atlanta.

A friend of mine, Ed, returned from the Army.  His father was in a serious accident and Ed got a hardship discharge to help with the family.  Ed asked me to get him a date and I got him a date with my co-worker Sue.  They hit it off., got married, had two children and got a divorce.

But first, after they hit it off and was heavily dating I joined the Naval Reserves and became a regular customer at the E.M. Club at NAS Atlanta.

Sue lined me up with a date with her cousin Billie Jean who lived with her folks in Newnan, Georgia, and we double dated with Sue and Ed a few times.

I think we just went to a movie and out to eat one time and to the lake another time.  But the time we went to the E.M. Club at NAS Atlanta I think gave us memories.  There was a country rock band playing.  Billie Jean was bopping with the music and before too long, I think I had enough drinks to ask her to dance.  We got on the dance floor and I started making fun of people jerking around to the music and she likewise... I think that night we created the would-be-famous-some-day the reeling in of your dance partner like on fishing rod and reel - but if I remember correctly I didn't reel her in but lassoed her and pulled her in with an invisible rope... and she galloped around the perimeter of the walls and I behind her slapping the back of my leg.... everybody stopped dancing and stood and watched us.  We put on quiet a show - it seemed like keeping a beat with the music we communicated on the same wave lenght and we pulled the band and the others in with us. 


Shortly after that I went into the Navy on active duty for two years.  When I returned Johnny and Billie Jean were married.  They first adopted a child and had their 2nd one naturally.  Many couples did that, first adopted then I think the motherhood juices started flowing naturally and the second child was natural.

In time Billy Jean started a retirement or nursing home.  Her parents were in the same kind of business when she grew up which probably gave her all the ins and outs.

Johnny and Billie Jean's daughter gave her a granddaughter about a week before she died.