Thoughts on my 48th Wedding Anniversary

 

I was sitting on the back porch having a rather modest Anniversary dinner with Bob when I said to him, “Isn’t it amazing to think that we have lived together for all these years in probably the most intimate relationship that any two human beings can have, and yet for the first 24 years of my life I didn’t even know you existed.” That is such a simple fact but, tonight for some reason, it seemed so unbelievable.  We talked about the fact that the night we first laid eyes on each other, we were at a place called “The Desert Inn” ( it was alongside the Van Wyck Expressway in Queens, NY ). The Desert Inn was basically a bar/dance place that young people frequented - the slang terminology used to describe such a place back in the 1960’s was “a pick up joint”.   Until tonight I always thought that it was probably one of Bob’s usual hangouts.  He said he rarely, if ever went there.  Surprisingly, I rarely, if ever went there either.  But for some reason, the night before Thanksgiving in 1969 we both happened to go. Bob was there with his friends and I was there alone, waiting to meet up with friends. I drove my own car that Wednesday night because I was scheduled to work in the Pediatric Intensive Care Unit at Downstate Medical Center on Thanksgiving day, and I didn’t want to stay out too late.  I spoke to Bob that night but our conversation was rather brief as shortly after arriving at The Desert Inn, his friend, Walter, had come over to me as I stood on the edge of the dance floor, bought me a drink and asked me to dance.  When Bob was introduced to me and started a conversation, Walter basically “grabbed my hand and pulled me away” at the same time saying to Bob, “ what is this, an interview?” ( LOL Bob was always a good interviewer!!) 

I went out just once with Walter but believe me, once was more than enough.  I knew without a shadow of a doubt that “he was not my person “. 

I remember feeling badly that I hadn’t gotten to spend more time with the other guy, Bob.  Seems like men had more power in this regard. Anyway, I figured I wouldn’t find him again in a city with over 8 million people. 

One month later, in late December 1969, my friend, Gail, coaxed me into going to another hangout called “Pep McGuires” on Queens Blvd in Flushing, NY.  It was not my “cup of tea” but I consented to go for an hour.  Bob was standing there on the other side of that big square bar and I boldly walked right up to him and said, “Do you remember me?” 

So this is how a complete stranger became my most intimate human being.  

I just think life is interesting and amazing, don’t you? 

Wisdom Gleaned from Our Marriage

Since we are fast approaching our 48th Wedding Anniversary, Athena and Christine asked us to share some of the lessons that we’ve learned about marriage. Another way you might put it is, “ How the hell did you make it this far?! We were humbled by their request as we certainly don’t consider ourselves any kind of experts and I dare say luck has a lot to do with it.

Mary Beth speaks: First of all our Initial Spark was an exciting and important component. 

We also had a lot in common in our background, including our Irish-German heritage. ( Bob's Mom was baptized Loretta Carney and my Mom, Rita Mary O'Donnell - Bob is a Buchner and my family name was Fries)
Nonetheless our 1st year of marriage was tough, some would even define it as " brutal".  

Bob speaks: I remember an Anniversary card that my brother, Bill, sent us after our first year of marriage, showing Clark Gable coming in off the desert looking half dead and the words on the card read, “Glad to see you made it through the year”.  Being married was certainly a learning curve for me! 

Mary Beth speaks: Then Bob’s promise to me that our love would be different and would survive the test of time held me in place and really meant something special to me.  Many times over the last 48 years I thought about this initial promise Bob made to me at the beginning of our relationship. As unromantic as it sounds I believe that we make a conscious decision to continue to love each other even when the feelings are subdued or less than stellar. 

Love is not just a feeling it is also a commitment to each other.
A sense of humor helped us survive many an argument. 

(One thing that I had to my advantage was the fact that I was a nurse. I was not the first nurse that Bob ever dated and he was really looking for free nursing care for life!)

I have immensely enjoyed watching Bob show love to others - how can you not love a person who is gentle and kind to old people and young children alike? That kind of behavior is a real aphrodisiac. Surrounding ourselves with loving friends such as Athena and Christine and their darling children certainly helps a marriage survive and flourish. Thank You for that wonderful gift.
I like the fact that Bob isn’t especially jealous and that he was, and is, strong enough to let me do my own thing. (He doesn't suppress my outspoken opinions either!)
I believe it is important that we have been able to forgive each other (sometimes over and over and over again) and that we are relatively patient with each other’s shortcomings. 
He was never any good at writing mushy love letters but his actions spoke volumes - I like that he was able to make me feel his love through the things he did for me and the people I love.

Bob speaks:

I think our marriage has been aided by: 

Our ability to communicate clearly and often.

Telling each other that we’re thankful for having each other in our life.

Making time for the two of us as a couple, and also leaving some personal time for each of us.

As Mary Beth said earlier, learning to forgive.  If we would have an argument and be angry with each other, we tried to never go to sleep without saying we’re sorry.

Here are a few things that I’ve learned on a lighter side:

Marriage is a relationship in which one person is always right and the other person is me.

If you’re wrong and you shut up you’re wise.  If you’re right and you shut up, you’re married.

I’ve never laughed at Mary Beth’s choices since I am one of them.

Even as an accountant, I learned new math after marriage.  If I have $20 and Mary Beth has $5, then she has $25.

A great marriage is NOT when the perfect couple comes together.  

  

It’s when an imperfect couple learns to enjoy their differences.

And with that we thank you for listening!

.

 

Our House is a Very, Very Fine House

So we are staying here! We backed out of our contract to buy the ranch across the street for a number of reasons.  The ranch across the street is lovely in case anyone is interested. We forfeited our deposit and turned over the Inspection Report therefore our change of heart️ cost us over $2600! (in just two weeks time).  We decided we not leave our trees and our backyard  and our glorious summer porch and our hardwood floors and our gas burning stove and our nice spacious rooms and the best dining room in all of Colonie ( well I may be a little biased on that one!  ) We can still get up the stairs and will put in a chair lift should that become necessary.  We decided the exercise is good for our cardiovascular health.  Thank goodness we both were on the same page with this decision - no argument there!  We woke up one morning on a blowup mattress in our family room (our oak tread stairs were being redone and we were sleeping downstairs for a couple of nights) and looked at each other and basically spontaneously said why are we doing this? We learned some interesting things in the process.   I learned that I take after my father a bit in the fact that I hate being told “you need to get granite countertops”and “your kitchen is too 1980’s “.  Why would I pull out a perfectly functional counter top simply because it is mauve in color? I’ll simply call my kitchen a retro look kitchen! Who knows, maybe I’ll start a new trend. I have custom made solid oak kitchen cabinets that were recently refinished by a 92 year old guy out in the country we call Fred the Junkman. He is a retired Nassau County Cop who years ago opened a marvelous “junk” store out in the country.  We took the cabinet doors off and delivered them to him and he sanded and refinished them at a very good price. In fact we paid him more than he asked for!  I will never cover this marvelous wood with white paint no matter what is in vogue.  And when it comes time to sell, I refuse to remove the photos of the people I love just so they can envision themselves living in my home. Hopefully they have good enough imaginations to picture their own loved ones in their place.   Bob promised to use the money we would have paid into a Home Owners Association fee in a Senior’s Only Development ( such as Maxwell Village down the street which oddly enough is mostly two stories anyway!) to hire help to maintain the outside area and I have vowed to clean out the clutter and simplify our life inside the house.  I have started and I will report back to you on my progress periodically ( it helps me stay true to my commitment ).   Besides with the rate of development here in Colonie, we may have the only trees left in town!!! Lastly we have loads of kids moving into the neighborhood and the beautiful sounds they make are delightful.

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.