This is a lovely lovely phrasing of what it means to be in genuine partnership with another: "Like plants turning toward sunlight, we have turned toward possibility. We spot invitations to become gentler versions of ourselves—nowhere near every time, but often enough to make a difference." Thank you, Rona.
Yes! I also love the lines right before: “Neither of us managed to change the other, doggedly as we tried in the early years. And yet, side by side, we have changed.”
I met my husband in high school and this whole essay describes the growing together that can happen over decades— with effort and grace. I often say I’m lucky but it’s more complicated than that, which Rona gets at too. 🙏
i can't get over that eclipse watcher he made for you. The beauty of that gift! And it's so full of metaphor, like he recognized the sun that is you, and how sometimes a person can't look directly at the sun but finds another way to see it, to appreciate it, to love it. He knew beauty when he saw it, Keats or no Keats. Fifty-four years. That is so beautiful.
And at the time I didn't have a clue. I was so incurious, on top of everything else. He gave me time to grow into myself. Of course you would find the metaphor. Every writer needs a mary g.
Your romance with your husband is just beautiful. Enough love to accept one another the way you are. I didn't find that until husband number two, but thank god i have it now.
Such a thoughtful and wondrous piece! My beloved died 10 months ago - 4 months shy of 63 years together. So many hard times. So many years of the practical - children, jobs, college, grad school, managing/maintaining life - house mates (with privileges), hanging in. And to both our surprise, the last 25 year (a quarter century!) falling deeply in love. Finally - we had time for each other. Finally - we stopped trying to change each other. Finally - the realization of the deep respect and the shared history and the reality that no one, no one, had played more of a role in making each of into the person we had become. This has been a year of grief, but also of pouring through our lifetime of growing up, of adventure, of family. He could always make me laugh. How lucky we have been to achieve this last 25 years.
Oh, Julie! You two put in close to 40 mixed and difficult years to reap your reward of the last 25. You are a testament to the power of tenacity, blind faith, pig-headedness…whatever it was that bound you. I am sorry for your loss of this great and foundational love.
Rona writes about long marriages (and what got them there) better than anyone I have read. So much so that I immediately went into where my other half was watching a football game and engaged in a long discussion about the bumps along the way in our case and how easy it is now.
My father's 'test' was whether you appreciated the ONLY way to eat steak, namely very very rare (he failed, oh dear) and whether you could do manly things like drive a car with panache (failed again, never learned to drive, never really needed to).
We never split up in our 60 years, but there were two dodgy moments. The first time was six months into our marriage when we were both graduate students but somehow I was doing virtually all the house cleaning (my husband talked about equality and meant it, but in 1963 we both fell into the traditional roles). I thought about moving out but was strongly motivated by the knowledge that I didn't want to prove my mother right. We slowly righted the balance instead. The second was some years later when I was trying to work part-time with a two-year old and he liked to stay late at work, but I was in a new place (London), had no family, few friends and absolutely nowhere to go. We talked about the issues instead. It was difficult then, but gosh, I am so happy we never split.
The joys of a long marriage are hardly ever written about, but is something I think about a lot, especially when lock-down hit and households were 'stuck' together. I noticed that I never felt remotely 'stuck' and neither did other friends with happy marriages.
OMG Rona, I laughed OUT LOUD multiple times. There are so many lines I'd like to quote, but I've had a bit of rum, so I'm feeling romantic.
"I’d known Paul for about three months when it became clear that any place we shared was home—even the roach-infested flat we could barely afford. We fought ardently and made love in the afternoon with the heedless freedom of the intermittently employed."
Loved this and the previous anniversary post, Rona. My husband and I celebrated 33 years in February, so we've got a ways to go to catch up with you/yours. But the timing of these reads? Like they were orchestrated by the gods themselves! We had a bit of a spat last night over nonsense and miscommunication, smoothed things over before bedtime, and today we sally forth. He said, with a chuckle, "We may have our differences. But we're not quitters!"
Here's to you two and all the Us-es out there enjoying their gas-station sandwiches right now. 🧡
Elizabeth, what a delightful comment. Your husband is right: It takes a stubborn streak to weather marital ups, downs and dead zones. Michelle Obama has said she "couldn't stand" Barack for 10 years, and I get it.
ooo Rona, so many good lines in this one. And so much wisdom, derived from 50+ years in a marriage. I especially loved this: “We fought ardently and made love in the afternoon with the heedless freedom of the intermittently employed.” Making ardent love in the afternoon is a wonderful memory for me too. But now, more important in a 50+ year marriage, is the feeling of capaciousness and trust and depths and depths of knowing each other. Well, it’s hard to explain but you’ve done a magnificent job in this post. Thank you.
After 50 years, I’m still carrying the emotional load for both of us. At the beginning I thought it was because he didn’t love me. But actually, it’s his brain wiring. Loving someone on the aspy continuum can be hard. But on our first date, he charmed me playing Scriabin on the baby grand that took up 90% of his dingy, one-room basement apartment. His “closets” were cardboard boxes. He cut his fried egg in four neat sections before he ate it. And because I loved the bracelet he gave me on Christmas (after failing with dish towels the Christmas before), he has given me some version of the same one every year since. And I know it’s because it’s such a relief for him to have found something that says “I love you” when he can’t do the words.
Susan, this character sketch of your husband is so tenderly specific and endearing. I love the egg cut into four sections and the ritual gift that says “I love you.” In developing relationships there can be a long period of bedevilment when one doesn’t grasp the other’s way of making the point. It’s a miracle that so many of us persist and allow ourselves to be surprised by the mysteries of loving.
After 50 years, I’m still carrying the emotional load for both of us. At the beginning I thought it was because he didn’t love me. But actually, it’s his brain wiring. Loving someone on the aspy continuum can be hard. But on our first date, he charmed me playing Scriabin on the baby grand that took up 90% of his dingy, one-room basement apartment. His “closets” were cardboard boxes. He cut his fried egg in four neat sections before he ate it. And because I loved the bracelet he gave me on Christmas (after failing with dish towels the Christmas before), he has given me some version of the same one every year since. And I know it’s because it’s such a relief for him to have found something that says “I love you” when he can’t do the words.
This is just so delightful, for so many reasons that others have already noted. I also liked this: "At 20 I’d been waiting for love to come my way. It would arrive in a black leather jacket, not brown corduroy. In the pocket, e.e. cummings, not P.G. Wodehouse" because it reminded me so much of myself.
My now-husband and I moved into together with our kids from previous marriages, and then we needed to separate to meet our children's needs. It was hard. One day he went with me to look for a house that I would live in without him. I saw one that was impractical, but I loved. He was baffled by my desire for it. Then we went to another one that checked all of the boxes I said were important to me, but nothing about it made my heart flutter. "This is a great house," he said. I told him it was like a guy who wears khaki pants and has a sensible job, but the other house was a poet who rides a motorcycle. He laughed and agreed and said I should buy it anyway. For once, I realized that I might be better served by a khaki pants kind of guy. I bought the sensible house, and I have grown to love it, deeply. Some charms aren't obvious right away. (We now live in it together, mostly happily ever after.)
Like many of your other readers, I'm dazzled and touched by the homemade eclipse glasses, Rona -- along with the everything else in this wonderful essay. What an incredible partnership you and Paul have, worthy of giving up a big share of pie. I think that a good marriage is something you can only grow into over the years and decades. Who knew how important non-glamorous qualities like tenacity and stubbornness would be? Maybe we should re-write the vows.
Beautifully captures the then and now of a long marriage. I knew my husband of almost 35 years loved me not when he proposed but when he said he'd move to NYC where I was living and working. We headed that way but life on a sailboat changed us both instead.
This is a lovely lovely phrasing of what it means to be in genuine partnership with another: "Like plants turning toward sunlight, we have turned toward possibility. We spot invitations to become gentler versions of ourselves—nowhere near every time, but often enough to make a difference." Thank you, Rona.
I’m touched that you picked up on this, Amanda. Thiese lines took extra work and thought.
This was also the phrase that jumped out at me. It perfectly captures the incremental journey of loving relationships.
Good to see you here, Margaret. Thank you.
Yes! I also love the lines right before: “Neither of us managed to change the other, doggedly as we tried in the early years. And yet, side by side, we have changed.”
I met my husband in high school and this whole essay describes the growing together that can happen over decades— with effort and grace. I often say I’m lucky but it’s more complicated than that, which Rona gets at too. 🙏
This was my favorite part of the piece.
Well, talk about delightful! Yes, houses are a lot like people. And our leather-jacket loft was definitely not a keeper for a couple of sexagenarians.
i can't get over that eclipse watcher he made for you. The beauty of that gift! And it's so full of metaphor, like he recognized the sun that is you, and how sometimes a person can't look directly at the sun but finds another way to see it, to appreciate it, to love it. He knew beauty when he saw it, Keats or no Keats. Fifty-four years. That is so beautiful.
And at the time I didn't have a clue. I was so incurious, on top of everything else. He gave me time to grow into myself. Of course you would find the metaphor. Every writer needs a mary g.
Your romance with your husband is just beautiful. Enough love to accept one another the way you are. I didn't find that until husband number two, but thank god i have it now.
Such a thoughtful and wondrous piece! My beloved died 10 months ago - 4 months shy of 63 years together. So many hard times. So many years of the practical - children, jobs, college, grad school, managing/maintaining life - house mates (with privileges), hanging in. And to both our surprise, the last 25 year (a quarter century!) falling deeply in love. Finally - we had time for each other. Finally - we stopped trying to change each other. Finally - the realization of the deep respect and the shared history and the reality that no one, no one, had played more of a role in making each of into the person we had become. This has been a year of grief, but also of pouring through our lifetime of growing up, of adventure, of family. He could always make me laugh. How lucky we have been to achieve this last 25 years.
Oh, Julie! You two put in close to 40 mixed and difficult years to reap your reward of the last 25. You are a testament to the power of tenacity, blind faith, pig-headedness…whatever it was that bound you. I am sorry for your loss of this great and foundational love.
Rona writes about long marriages (and what got them there) better than anyone I have read. So much so that I immediately went into where my other half was watching a football game and engaged in a long discussion about the bumps along the way in our case and how easy it is now.
My father's 'test' was whether you appreciated the ONLY way to eat steak, namely very very rare (he failed, oh dear) and whether you could do manly things like drive a car with panache (failed again, never learned to drive, never really needed to).
We never split up in our 60 years, but there were two dodgy moments. The first time was six months into our marriage when we were both graduate students but somehow I was doing virtually all the house cleaning (my husband talked about equality and meant it, but in 1963 we both fell into the traditional roles). I thought about moving out but was strongly motivated by the knowledge that I didn't want to prove my mother right. We slowly righted the balance instead. The second was some years later when I was trying to work part-time with a two-year old and he liked to stay late at work, but I was in a new place (London), had no family, few friends and absolutely nowhere to go. We talked about the issues instead. It was difficult then, but gosh, I am so happy we never split.
The joys of a long marriage are hardly ever written about, but is something I think about a lot, especially when lock-down hit and households were 'stuck' together. I noticed that I never felt remotely 'stuck' and neither did other friends with happy marriages.
Yes! We never felt more blessed than we did in lockdown, when so many were either alone or trapped in destructive marriages.
OMG Rona, I laughed OUT LOUD multiple times. There are so many lines I'd like to quote, but I've had a bit of rum, so I'm feeling romantic.
"I’d known Paul for about three months when it became clear that any place we shared was home—even the roach-infested flat we could barely afford. We fought ardently and made love in the afternoon with the heedless freedom of the intermittently employed."
Best thing I could hear is “I laughed out loud.” Thanks, Jay.
Loved this and the previous anniversary post, Rona. My husband and I celebrated 33 years in February, so we've got a ways to go to catch up with you/yours. But the timing of these reads? Like they were orchestrated by the gods themselves! We had a bit of a spat last night over nonsense and miscommunication, smoothed things over before bedtime, and today we sally forth. He said, with a chuckle, "We may have our differences. But we're not quitters!"
Here's to you two and all the Us-es out there enjoying their gas-station sandwiches right now. 🧡
Elizabeth, what a delightful comment. Your husband is right: It takes a stubborn streak to weather marital ups, downs and dead zones. Michelle Obama has said she "couldn't stand" Barack for 10 years, and I get it.
🤣
This was a beautiful Sunday morning read! I can't answer the question because I'm not in love but I could sit and read about yours all day!
Glad you enjoyed it, Kristi.
What a beautiful read on this, my 51st wedding anniversary! Thank you.
Happy anniversary!
ooo Rona, so many good lines in this one. And so much wisdom, derived from 50+ years in a marriage. I especially loved this: “We fought ardently and made love in the afternoon with the heedless freedom of the intermittently employed.” Making ardent love in the afternoon is a wonderful memory for me too. But now, more important in a 50+ year marriage, is the feeling of capaciousness and trust and depths and depths of knowing each other. Well, it’s hard to explain but you’ve done a magnificent job in this post. Thank you.
Means a lot, Debbie. I so enjoy our connections at your place or mine.
After 50 years, I’m still carrying the emotional load for both of us. At the beginning I thought it was because he didn’t love me. But actually, it’s his brain wiring. Loving someone on the aspy continuum can be hard. But on our first date, he charmed me playing Scriabin on the baby grand that took up 90% of his dingy, one-room basement apartment. His “closets” were cardboard boxes. He cut his fried egg in four neat sections before he ate it. And because I loved the bracelet he gave me on Christmas (after failing with dish towels the Christmas before), he has given me some version of the same one every year since. And I know it’s because it’s such a relief for him to have found something that says “I love you” when he can’t do the words.
Susan, this character sketch of your husband is so tenderly specific and endearing. I love the egg cut into four sections and the ritual gift that says “I love you.” In developing relationships there can be a long period of bedevilment when one doesn’t grasp the other’s way of making the point. It’s a miracle that so many of us persist and allow ourselves to be surprised by the mysteries of loving.
After 50 years, I’m still carrying the emotional load for both of us. At the beginning I thought it was because he didn’t love me. But actually, it’s his brain wiring. Loving someone on the aspy continuum can be hard. But on our first date, he charmed me playing Scriabin on the baby grand that took up 90% of his dingy, one-room basement apartment. His “closets” were cardboard boxes. He cut his fried egg in four neat sections before he ate it. And because I loved the bracelet he gave me on Christmas (after failing with dish towels the Christmas before), he has given me some version of the same one every year since. And I know it’s because it’s such a relief for him to have found something that says “I love you” when he can’t do the words.
This is just so delightful, for so many reasons that others have already noted. I also liked this: "At 20 I’d been waiting for love to come my way. It would arrive in a black leather jacket, not brown corduroy. In the pocket, e.e. cummings, not P.G. Wodehouse" because it reminded me so much of myself.
My now-husband and I moved into together with our kids from previous marriages, and then we needed to separate to meet our children's needs. It was hard. One day he went with me to look for a house that I would live in without him. I saw one that was impractical, but I loved. He was baffled by my desire for it. Then we went to another one that checked all of the boxes I said were important to me, but nothing about it made my heart flutter. "This is a great house," he said. I told him it was like a guy who wears khaki pants and has a sensible job, but the other house was a poet who rides a motorcycle. He laughed and agreed and said I should buy it anyway. For once, I realized that I might be better served by a khaki pants kind of guy. I bought the sensible house, and I have grown to love it, deeply. Some charms aren't obvious right away. (We now live in it together, mostly happily ever after.)
Like many of your other readers, I'm dazzled and touched by the homemade eclipse glasses, Rona -- along with the everything else in this wonderful essay. What an incredible partnership you and Paul have, worthy of giving up a big share of pie. I think that a good marriage is something you can only grow into over the years and decades. Who knew how important non-glamorous qualities like tenacity and stubbornness would be? Maybe we should re-write the vows.
Maybe there was also a bit of inertia involved.
Beautifully captures the then and now of a long marriage. I knew my husband of almost 35 years loved me not when he proposed but when he said he'd move to NYC where I was living and working. We headed that way but life on a sailboat changed us both instead.
Moving for someone is a huge commitment. How lovely that you found someplace different that attracted both of you.
We travel a LOT, but it turns out we both love it, and home is where the heart is!
The gift of handmade spectacles to observe the eclipse stole my heart! And giving up the biggest slice of raspberry pie? Actions speak so loudly.
If only that gift could have stolen my heart at the time. I was not only callous but incurious.
and do you have his pair of green and red paper glasses ready for the big event?