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Darling Sylvia,

I trust you; you have my back. You support me, but my taking your input requires you to read what I need and what I can accept. You have learned to match your support to my needs. You somehow divine when I need a hug and when I need a kick in the ass. You know when to listen to my words and when to listen to my heart. You are my safe space, my cheerleader, and my partner.

Your support makes safe space for me. You get me with my insecurities. You truly know I am an introvert in noisy clothing. My intuitions and roles I choose can take me outside of my comfort zone. The non-verbal three-year-old in me prefers to crawl back behind Mom’s corner china-closet. You recognize my tells, and I feel your support as I work myself through situations. You trust the end even if my process is sometimes uncomfortable for you.

Your support helps me face my fears. You hold my hand for prostate cancer appointments. You make me feel safer as I hear scary things. You allow me to voice my fears to you while remaining an “adult,” if I have to.

Your support is affirming in much more fun ways, too. You cheer on my commitments in the community. You stir grits at dawn while I fix breakfast to haul to church for the Methodist Men. You share the hospitality of our home with “my” groups of men and students.

You are a supportive partner with “my” hobby/business cut flower industry. I crave your “ooh—ahhhs” over what is blooming in the garden. At market, we share the work and the loveseat. You excel in community building. After market, we collapse together in our blue chair and rehash all the miracles of the day.

Some 58 years ago, I came back to the dorm from Lumberjack Park amazed that you loved me more than I loved myself. Sylvia, you are a good person, a loving mother and grandma, but you are my lover and my best friend. I won the most important lottery of all.

Love you.    Eddie B.

Dear Eddie: We just enjoyed one of our quarterly two-night getaways. This time, it was with the Better Marriages North Carolina folks. I enjoyed relaxing in intentional marriage enrichment space with you and only being responsible for one piece of programming. We spent a lot of time thinking and talking about being supportive spouses. In those conversations, and with that group of couples, I found myself being grateful for the love and support we have received from other couples in our married life.

Way back at Alma College, when we were engaged, I remember married couples who first treated us as another couple. Dr. and Mrs. Kapp and Dr. and Mrs. Eyer invited us to their homes for dessert and gave us wedding presents. I think they gave us more in support. I think they enjoyed their own marriages very much. They were all four dynamic interesting individuals who really liked their spouses. I think they saw us having the real possibility of growing into that kind of marriage. They kept us in their circle of support as long as they lived.

At the conference, I was grateful for the many couples who have shared their real marriages-ups and downs, joys and concerns, difficulties and learnings-with us over the years. We have admired them, yes, but more than that, I think we have been inspired by them to live genuinely, to risk talking about hard stuff, to see ourselves on a growth trajectory. They took risks, and they kept themselves in the support of other couples who did the same. They cracked sometimes but healed and grew.

I am grateful that you were and are willing to keep our marriage in what we call a marriage-friendly connection. We were barely thirty when we were invited into marriage enrichment. The support of that cloud of witnesses goes on even fifty years later and even after the deaths of many of our friends. I want every couple to find a trustworthy connection. They need other people who love their own spouses and want to grow and stay together.

Thank you always for taking the risk to live real with me and with those who support us. I love you.

Sylvia

Who supports your vision for your marriage? Who do you trust to have your best interest at heart?

Brainstorm together resources you might seek (people, groups, books, websites, organizations.) What one move will you make toward a marriage-friendly connection?

Darling Sylvia,

Grace notes are musical ornaments. I was introduced to bagpipe grace notes during the fall of 1970 by Charlie Russell, lead piper in Saint Paul’s Irish Pipe Band.  He taught me how to use my right pinky to flit across the bottom hole of my chanter, adding  grace notes to Scotland the Brave. The presence of grace notes elevates the pipe’s playing above the ordinary. In our 54 years of marriage, I know that it is the grace notes (little things, actions, and habits) that take our love above the treble clef.

Grace notes, intentionally made to honor you, me, and our we, make all the difference. We have learned to name and honor the intentional grace notes that nourish us. My grace notes to you include not being afraid to tell you I love you. I learned to say I am wrong (out loud) and that I am truly sorry that I hurt you. I gladly apply Aspercreme to your beautiful body before you go to sleep.  The last words I say to you at night are, “I love you, and I am the luckiest man in the world.” I am so glad we met at Alma College. I make gestures to tell you that you count.  I pick up my clothes–and put them into the washer. I take the garbage out on Sunday night. I open car doors, set a pretty table (flowers, wine glasses, and scented candles), and hold you in my arms when you are missing your dad or mom. I try desperately to be thoughtful because I honor and cherish the person you are.

Your grace notes for me include putting my pills together and reminding me to take them. You remind me when the remote check of my pacemaker is due. You take me on Harbor Freight dates and buy drill presses and tool boxes. You lay out clothes for me to wear so that I will look hot for an old guy.  You cut my hair and trim my mustache.  You let me not be strong. I can cry and not be embarrassed. You laugh at my jokes and buy me beer even though the taste of it disgusts you. You keep the books and do the taxes. You remind me when I am over the speed limit where the police in Waleska hide.

We both play grace notes to our we. They include holding hands in church and doing our Upper Room together after breakfast, folding and putting away laundry, and sitting side by side on our love seat at the Waleska Farmers’ Market. We shop together at Aldi for cheap wine. We fast together before early morning blood draws. We offer extra ears at way too many joint medical appointments.  We do Weight Watchers together.  We make sure we get our two-night-away adventures every three months and celebrate them on the refrigerator Growth Plan. I am so glad we found each other.

Love, Your Lover Bert

What are the grace notes in your home? How do you and your mate honor each other and grow your joint we?

Darling Sylvia,

Returning home from our Marriage Getaway at Hilton Head, I am full of feelings; I feel… I feel confident that in high tides and in the inevitable low tides, I will be all right as long as you are by my side.

When I am with you, I feel alive. Your presence by my side expands my universe. You rock my world. You let me share your viewpoint. When you share what you see, I become aware of the beauty around me, the daffodils in the ditch, the golden jasmine in the forest canopy and the red haze of the maples in the swamp.

Your presence in my life fills my senses like the sweet fragrance of Yesterday, Today, and Tomorrow. Whenever I see your smiling face, my world becomes a brighter and warmer place. You light up my world.

When you lay your head on my shoulder and I look down into the depths of your eyes, I feel at peace. When you reach out and touch my face, my skin tingles. When you pet my hair, my pacemaker skips a beat.

As we sleep. the heat of your back against mine calms my very busy mind. You warm my soul. You bring love into my life. You are my lover and my best friend.

Happy Valentine’s Day

Your Lover Bert

What thoughts will you share with your partner today?

Where do you have highs in low places?

Darling Sylvia, We are better together. We are like a hot cup of Earl Grey tea with four drops of honey better. You have helped me to learn the lost art of speaking for self. When needed, you wave your hand in the air and ask to stop the action long enough to have a couple dialogue. If it is possible, we sit down knee to knee, hand to hand, and heart to heart. In assuming the dialogue position, both of us honor the we that we cherish.

The knee-to-knee dialogue position forces me to look directly into your beautiful blue eyes and remember that the we is what both of us cherish.  The trust found in that position helps us do this marriage thing better. We have a body memory of how to behave with each other in the dialogue position. Over the years, we have had many caring and helpful conversations in this space. The knee to knee has given us a safe place through the many highs and lows that life together has brought.

Now, after years of practice using the dialogue position, I can acknowledge that I have feelings that at one time I did not know existed. Mad, sad and glad were once the only words in my feelings vocabulary. With your help, that list  has expanded exponentially; go figure. Using I messages keeps me honest and encourages me to bring to the dialogue what I want with a clear responsibility to honor the we. We are better together.

Roses are red and violets are blue, Angels in heaven know I love you.

Eddie Bert

Darling Sylvia, I was shocked. The electrical impulse jumped from the garden fence through my elbow to the wet ground below. I blinked, dismissed it, and once again touched my elbow to the fence. This time my whole body flinched. It is a good thing I have a Ph. D., or I would have felt silly. I had unlatched the gate without touching the wires and neglected to turn off the electric fence. A month later, my pacemaker readout confirmed that on April 27 at 10:17, I had two heart episodes, 6 seconds apart. My heart rate hit 86 and, with the second jolt, jumped to 286 beats per minute. Shocked.

The fence shocked me, but you shock (astonish) me more often than I like to admit. You keep learning new stuff.  I am in awe of the way you organize our social media connections with family, friends, and our growing farmers’ market community. You have always been a good finder, but you only get better at finding things like my glasses, truck keys, kids’ shoes, etc. etc. I have known grandkids to call you long distance to be walked through where they might find their glasses. I am shocked and sometimes dismayed at the rapidity with which you can fact check my b.s. on Google.

After 53 years of marriage, I am still discovering who you are. I knew who you were, but you keep changing, becoming someone new and even more exciting. I am shocked when I realize that I am 75 years old, and you still make my saliva flow. I am shocked that you are still interested in me. I am shocked that you still have the expectation that I can become a better man. You and God are not finished with me yet. I am shocked and delighted that our love is becoming even stronger.

Love you. Eddie B.

Who was I?/ Who were you?/Who were we?

What expectations do I/you/we have for our future?

Dear Eddie, I often catch myself asking, “What kind of man is this?” Sometimes, I am laughing. Sometimes, I am exclaiming. Sometimes, I am wondering, in a really holy sense. Always, I am appreciating, even if I don’t say it at the moment.

What kind of man asks, “What are the growing edges of our marriage?” We are coming up on our 53rd anniversary, and you are still asking. And, when we have the conversations, you and I listen and set goals and try to grow, and you call us back to accountability to the goals we set. You ask.

What kind of man chases his wife at 75? You comment, “You have a waist!” “I like your butt when you (fill in the blank) open the stove drawer… bend over the dishwasher.” What kind of 75 year old man gets tickled rubbing in Aspercreme and catches himself drooling? You chase me.

What kind of man is that generous? You have always been a “touch” for panhandlers, but you really do have a huge heart. You are a big tipper remembering that “we have family in the restaurant industry.” You love to give balloons to the children who come to our farmers’ market flower stall. And, most notoriously, you regularly fuss that it is your turn for the $60 cut of the $100 ATM stop, but, I just turn around, and there you are paying forward for some little family in a restaurant, especially if they have that certain mix of kids just like ours. If the young dad catches us in the parking lot to protest, you bless him and his family and send him packing.  You give.

What kind of man never hesitates to say I love you? Your most common question is, “Have I told you in the last 20 minutes that I love you?” You tell me.

What kind of man insists there be time for the two of us? You insist.

What kind of man does all of these perhaps crazy things?  My kind of Man.

Thank you, precious,

Love, Sylvia