Karen: I told him that was not for public knowledge! I don’t know that my mom ever heard that story and she didn’t appreciate us not showing up.

Skip: There’s a story in the middle there. We were engaged in December and in February we went to the doctor to get birth control pills, but when we got there the doctor said, “Well, it’s too late for that.”

Karen: Kharma was born in October. We were married in May.

So you were young parents. Was that hard?

Karen: He pretty much left the child rearing to me. His four words were “Go ask your mother” and mine were “don’t listen to him.” I don’t know that it’s the proper way to raise a child, but it’s the way it was. I always wanted to be a mom, but if I had it to do over again, I may have insisted that he take part more. But I was a child too and didn’t realize. I was happy to take the responsibility because I couldn’t imagine anything more worthwhile.

Skip: I’m about the least mature person you’ve ever met. But we were young, we didn’t have a clue.

No arguments about child rearing?

Skip: There was one big argument, back in ’73 or ’74 after Kharma was born and she was toddling around. On Saturdays we would sleep in and so she’d get up and get herself something from the kitchen. We took turns doing everything; cleaning, dishes. One Saturday there were about a dozen broken eggs on the floor. We couldn’t remember whose turn it was. I said I’m not picking it up and she said she wasn’t either. On Monday afternoon one of her friends came over and was getting a beer in the kitchen and said, “What the — —!” I told him it was Karen’s turn to clean and she said it was mine. We screamed and hollered and cursed. I’m pretty sure she cleaned up those eggs.

Karen: I don’t remember who cleaned it up, but probably him since he remembers it so well.

You both left school before Kharma was born?

Skip:

We were married on May 6. Then we went to Martha’s Vineyard, where my family spent summers — my father was very successful, he started one of the largest black-owned engineering firms, Ewell W. Finley. The following Monday, I began my career at WHDH-TV in Boston as a floor director and quit Northeastern that afternoon. Karen left Wheelock College in the fall, but got her math degree magna cum laude in 1995.