Toward the end of his Air Force schooling, Mike asked Libby to dinner when he returned. She had moved to an apartment in Cicero, Illinois, a working class neighborhood on Chicago's west side. That date led to a torrid period of real dating, as Mike drove nightly from Evanston (he had moved in with his parents after returning from Texas), to and from Cicero. It was a considerable distance, and Mike often staggered home at 1:00-2:00 in the morning, barely awake. He was fortunate not to fall asleep at the wheel or get picked up for erratic driving during this time...
After just 2 weeks, Mike asked Libby to marry him - she agreed! She would later say that, as much as anything, it was the flood of letters that won her over (she still has them). Together they started wedding plans.
Mike and Libby drove down to Owensboro, Kentucky, to visit her mother, Emma Payne. It was his first meeting of his future mother-in-law. He saw Libby's home town, and they met a number of Emma's friends. Mike's eyes were opened to "The South" and how Southerners thought about certain things, such as race. He saw that Libby had overcome a lot to become the woman with whom he had fallen in love.