Love stories

Many years ago when I was a practicing nurse, I worked in the post-surgical recovery room. Typically, each nurse was responsible for two patients. I had a nursing station with monitors on each side and a desk between two gurneys where sleepy people woke up after surgery. I really liked this job: patient in, patient out. Family members weren't allowed due to the proximity to the sterile surgical suites. Most people slept or were quiet until they were awake enough to be moved on to their hospital rooms. For an introvert, it was a perfect place to work: quiet, no crowds, and only one or two people to talk with at a time.

The sights and sounds were interesting, too. There was a good amount of retching and groaning in pain. One patient got up on one elbow and regaled us with bird calls for about 15 minutes. Another repeatedly asked where we had hidden his cows. One elderly woman did a slow stiptease with her pale blue hospital gown, grinning drunkenly at me. But most people rested quietly and chatted with me to pass the time.

One of my favorite questions to ask elderly people was, " How did you meet your wife?" Most people would perk up and respond with a lively story that was their own fairy tale. They'd laugh and tell me all the sweet little details of how they first noticed one another, their first date, and their first kiss. They often told me things about marriage and their lives that they'd not verbalized to anyone else. Some told me that they didn't recommend marriage but that it was nice to have someone waiting for them while they were in surgery. One man told me, "I'm married to a fat little angel. I love every ounce of that woman!" As a single person studying family therapy, this was all very fascinating.

One day an older woman came through the recovery room who had some emergency surgery like having her gall bladder or appendix removed. She hadn't the time to do anything with her hair and she looked like most of us do when we hope no one will ever see us outside the house. She was badly in need of a perm and her white frizzy hair stood straight up on her head. She looked so awful that she was cute. Her dentures had been removed and she sputtered happily in response to my comments.

"So how long have you been married?" I began the usual conversation.
"PFifty-eight yearffffph" she sputtered.
"And how did you two meet?" I eyed her sideways while I wrote in her chart.
At this, Mrs. Patient became quite animated. Her eyes widened and her face took on the look of someone who was about to tell me the greatest secret in the world.
"I met him in the canteen."
"No!" I exclaimed, trying to see how hyped up I could get this lady.
"Oh whyefffph!" she began. "Pfffeee, I uphfed to work in the canteen pfhelling drinkpf and the pfhoda counter." She swallowed. "oooh. I'm pfhitting cotton!" I gave her a sip of water and she continued with an air of great mystery and drama.
"The boyfph ufphed to come in there jufpht to fphee how pretty I wafph."
I looked at her for a long time trying to imagine that, as she looked like she'd been shot out of a cannon.

"Fphee, the boyfph came in to get their daily cofffphee and they brought thifph new boy becaufph they told him, 'hey, you fphsould fphee the new girl in the canteen.' Fphso in they come. I fphseen him and yup, he wafph a looker, too. When they come to the counter to pay for the coffphee, he done it. He looked me right in the eye and laid a dime in my hand."
She pulled herself up on one elbow and reached for my hand to show me how he had given her the dime.
"He had a nickel, but he wanted to toucfph my hand fpho he afphsked for phchangphe. And when hifph fphingerfph toucfphed my hand," her eyes were wild with the telling, "an electric fphshock phfshot fphtraight up my arm." Here eyes looked as though she'd just backed into a hot stove. "An I knew I'd marry him, and fpho did he."
She stared into my eyes for a long moment and lay back on her pillow with a dreamy smile on her lips. "We got married two weekfph later an we never been apart fphinfph."
I put down her chart and looked into her little wrinkled face. "And you never have regretted it, have you?"
"Never!" She jabbed me in the arm with her index finger for emphasis and settled back onto the gurney. Her face wore the expression of satisfaction.

That night I mused for a long time about my patient's delightful story. After I'd finished chuckling about how she looked, I thought how fortunate she was, tucked into bed with him in their home. They'd only slept apart twice during their marriage. There was something important for me to learn from her and I didn't want to miss it: what began as a romantic notion had grown into something beautiful. That was her story and she had stuck with it all these years.

There is something romantic about wartime bride stories during my parents' era. People saw each other across a darkened room and determined that they'd grow old together. They might dance together and feel safer in each other's arms than they'd ever felt before. Fifty years later, they'd still be dancing. And these were the stories I heard growing up and later, from old men and women who were only too happy to share them with me.

All of these marriages could not have been happy all the time, as most said they were. Maybe Betty complained that her Joe wasn't good with kids, or Mary wished her Bert was more handy like Sarah's Hugh. That's how life was and if that was as bad as it got, then they had nothing to complain about. But as they aged, they remembered more and more the positive, good things about each other and their lives together. Tense years and discordant phases of their marriage were not even remembered as they told me about how much they love one another. I've seen this phenomenon in my own parents. They look fondly at each other and tell me they'd do it all over again, a hundred times over.

Selective memory. In these stories, only the good stands out. No looming memories about the time she felt he talked too long to the woman neighbor, or when she threatened to leave him and take the children. Selective memory means they have forgiven each other for sometimes being unkind, insensitive, reckless, or unthinking. Their love overlooks these things and they have made peace with all the rough patches. Their love has endured and still shines through. That is why I can't hear enough of the love stories of our elders.