45 Years of Marital Bliss - More or Less

I laid awake half the night thinking of many things which is a sometimes annoying characteristic of my very active brain cells.  There is no question about it; I would have been diagnosed as having ADD or ADHD if I had been born 50 to 60 years later.

Probably one of the biggest videos that played through my mind all night was the review of the years that have transpired since the night before Thanksgiving in 1969 when I met a guy from Astoria by the name of Robert William Buchner at “The Desert Inn” in Queens, NY.    I went to this rather ordinary “pick up joint” along the Van Wyck Expressway in Queens, NY to meet friends and of course, to meet a guy or two.  I was going to be 25 years old on my upcoming birthday in March of 1970 and had just passed the date (November 8^th, 1969) that should have been my wedding!   This is another complicated story – not for this time - but needless to say the day came and went and I was still single, unattached and looking for Mr. Right. 

I met Mr. Wrong and Mr. Right that Thanksgiving Eve night, but luckily after a date with Mr. Wrong, and just one month later, I was lucky enough to accidently /coincidently run into Mr. Right at another famous “pick up joint” of this era, “Pep McGuire’s” .    Now I ask you, what were the chances of this happening in a city over 8 million people?   That night in December, 1969, Bob and I drank a couple of martini’s (each) and ended up making out passionately at the bar.  Tacky, right?  I thought so too, but after two martinis, I somehow didn’t care.

The video that I watched all night was rather lengthy; after all it was covering 45 plus years.  It was and is difficult to understand all that stuff and even more difficult to condense it all into a neat, concise package.    Nonetheless, I guess I felt it was worth reflecting on.   I tried to tell my mind,

“Let’s shut down for the night, get some sleep and think about it another time”, but my mind wasn’t buying it.  After all our relationship, our marriage and our life together is a monumental part of who I am, and who I have become, and it seemed important to me to look over the years and reflect on some things.   

There is so much to think about that my reflection “conclusions” could fill multiple pages. Also my blog entries would be complicated and not very easy to understand.   Possibly they might be helpful to others since they would be as honest as I could make them without too much negative exposure on anyone. 

Happily ever after stories make people who don’t always feel happily after sense that their marriage, their relationship, their story is a failure when in reality it is not.  Emotions are fleeting; they peak and wan, and peak and wan again, over and over.  There are great moments, there are ordinary moments, there are boring and angry moments.  There are times when love feels so strong and powerful.  And there are times when apathy and lack of interest overwhelm us.   As the years pass, we begin to get a grasp of what words like “for better or for worse, for richer or for poorer, in sickness and in health “really mean.   Who really knows what they are committing to when they speak those vows as young, healthy and robust individuals?

Forty-five years ago today, on September 18, 1971,I stood in the vestibule of St. Michael the Archangel’s Church on Jerome Street  in Brooklyn, NY waiting to walk up to the altar on the arm of my father, Charles A. Fries, Sr.   There at the front of the church stood a guy I met the year before in a bar in NYC.  In the sanctuary, before family and friends, we made a public promise to each other.  The more meaningful vow we had made in private both before and after the wedding when we promised that our love would be different, it would last “no matter what” and that when the going got tough, we wouldn’t get divorced but would stay together and work it out.   Sometimes, we have had to recall that promise.

I think we made a good choice in each other.  I think our love is different even though it is by no means “perfect” (many of our family and friends can attest to this!).   We still like to be together, but we are OK with having our own interests and pursuits and being apart.  We still like to share our love with the rest of the world.  

So, Happy Anniversary, Robert William Buchner.  Thanks for being my life partner.  Thanks for all you do for me and our family and friends.  I am proud of you and I love you.