A Cup of Comfort for Couples (4 page)

“We were on our way to the animal shelter. My husband had died a year before, and I'd been working all the hours God sent to make ends meet. And to forget. But I'd promised Lucy a white kitten for her seventh birthday, so I left work early that day to take her. She'd even picked out a name: Snowball.”

My voice caught, but I made myself go on. “The truck came out of nowhere, plowed right into us. I was thrown clear and knocked out. When I woke up, flames were everywhere. I tried to get up but kept falling. So I crawled toward the car, screaming for Lucy. I managed to pull her free before it exploded. I felt her body shudder and held my breath, as though by refusing to live I could force her to.”

My voice fell to a whisper. “I remember her first breath. The clear scream of greeting all mothers wait for. But her last breath, her last breath was as quiet as a sigh.”

Michael listened until the words and the tears slowed to a trickle. “And afterward, you decided to move here?”

I nodded. “We'd always talked about living by the water. Lucy loved Maine.”

“And you adopted the cat your daughter would have.”

“I didn't intend to. Oh, I knew about the shelter here, but I'd avoided the place for months. I just couldn't . . . ”

He nodded in understanding, and I swallowed hard.

“Yesterday, I found the courage to go there,” I said. “Just to drop off some food.”

My eyes strayed to where Snowball had fallen asleep on the edge of the couch, her head hanging over the side and her tail tucked between her front paws. “She was just so cute,” I smiled at the memory. “I had to pet her. Then hold her. Well, one thing led to another . . . ”

He nodded. “It was the same with me and Louie. I had no intention of getting a cat. Of course, he had other ideas. Fixed me with those big eyes of his, and I was lost.”

I shifted my gaze from the sleeping cats to his concerned face. It was a good face, I decided.

“You know,” he continued in a matter-of-fact voice, we should get them together for play dates. That way, they won't forget each other, and we can get to know one another.”

When I stiffened in response, he added hastily, “As friends. I mean, you're new to town, and I've lived here forever. I could show you around.”

At the expectant look on his face, I nodded and the knot around my heart began to loosen.

Michael and I began spending time together, and our relationship grew so gradually, it's difficult to know when we crossed the line from friendship to love. We had a simple wedding ceremony on the summit of a mountain overlooking the harbor town I'd come to think of as home. Michael moved into my house, and the comforting routine of our marriage helped wear smooth the jagged memories of my life before. When we were blessed with a child, I searched the solemn eyes of our infant girl and found nothing of Lucy. A part of me died that day, but another part began to heal.

Our daughter, Sara, is now fifteen and has grand plans: she wants to be a veterinarian like her father. Michael is thrilled at the thought of sharing with Sara his practice and stewardship of the shelter we now run.

Our cat, Louie, still makes an effort to run around the house, but most evenings he lounges before the fire waiting for us to rub his belly. The years have been less kind to Snowball. Arthritic and nearly blind, she rarely ventures beyond the quilts I scatter about the floor in a pattern meant to catch the sun as it moves throughout the day. Although my heart aches at the thought of losing her, I know that when she passes, Lucy will be waiting for her.

When Snowball hears my voice, she purrs in greeting and waits to be picked up. I hold her close and whisper her name, one that anchors me to the life I had before and reminds me of how blessed I am to have found Michael. Snowball, my little matchmaker.

—
Ariella Golani

My Other Husband

I
have been happily married for twenty-nine years . . . to two men. Fortunately, they both occupy the same body, so I'm not in danger of being carted off to prison anytime soon.

Husband number one's name is Fred — a hard-working mechanical engineer, quiet, reserved, an honorable man. Intelligent and analytical, he's a no-nonsense kind of guy on whom I can depend no matter what kind of crisis comes along. I am a free spirit, usually led by emotions, not logic; my response to most serious problems is to laugh and let God worry about them. Fred's is to weigh out the circumstances and calculate an appropriate course of action.

We are two very different personalities. So when people I know meet Fred for the first time, they are usually surprised. “He's so . . . serious,” they say.

I just smile because they don't know my “other” husband, Freddie.

I'll give you a for instance. You know how boring grocery shopping is? Not with Freddie. When he comes with me, this is usually how it goes:

We walk into the market and Freddie says, “I wanna push the cart!”

“Why?”

“I'm the man; I push the cart.”

“Okay. Whatever.”

And the adventure begins. I'm standing there trying to figure out which soup is the best buy, and when I go to put the chosen one into the cart, Freddie runs about six steps ahead. So I run to catch up, and he sprints about eight to ten steps farther on. Before long, I'm chasing him up and down the aisles, and we're laughing like fools, and people are beginning to stare.

Finally, stifling a giggle, I grab the vehicle away from him. “Okay, mister, you've lost your cart-pushing privileges! I'm pushing the cart from now on.”

“
Hmmph
.”

The minute I set my purse in the basket, Freddie jumps on the front — effectively stalling it where it stands.

“Get off the cart, Freddie.”

“I wanna ride!”

“You're heavy. Get off!”

“You don't love me.”

“Oh, for crying out loud. All right, but behave yourself.”

I'm checking out the prices on the paper towels, and when I turn around, Freddie, now off the cart and about fifteen feet away, is in his Michael Jordan mode — making basket after basket with assorted brands of toilet paper. There are now approximately twenty packages of tissue in my basket.

Trying not to laugh, and thus to encourage him, I yell, “
Stop
that
!”

People are gathering to watch.

Freddie, all innocence, asks, “What?”

I put all the toilet tissue back on the shelf and continue down the aisle. Freddie has disappeared, thank goodness. For the next five minutes, I finish my shopping in peace.

At the checkout counter, the clerk is ringing up my groceries when I stop her. “Hey, those aren't my ice cream bars.”

“Uh, they were in your basket, ma'am.”

“How did those four packages of Cheetos get in there?”

“Hmmm,” she says with a lifted eyebrow. “You might want to ask him.” She points at Freddie, who has suddenly appeared from out of nowhere, grinning like a hyperactive four-year-old.

I look at him suspiciously. “Where have you been?”

“Just messin' around.”

The clerk waves for my attention. “So will you be wanting this package of chicken feet?”

“
Freddie
!”

At this point, Freddie gives me his most lovable grin and in his best Bart Simpson voice says, “Ha ha! You love me!”

“No, I don't. You're a pain in the butt.”

“Yes, you do!”

I sigh. “Okay. I do. But I don't have to like it.”

By now, the clerk and the three people behind us in line are laughing out loud.

In the car as we drive home, Freddie goes into his bet-I-can-drive-you-crazy mode, grabbing my knee, tickling the back of my neck, rolling my window up and down.

“Quit it, Freddie!”

The response is, of course, an escalation of the behavior — until I give him The Look, and he settles down.

All is quiet for the next quarter mile, then suddenly he says, “Ha ha!”

I groan. “Ha ha, what?”

“Ha ha!” he repeats, tickled with himself. “You're married to me!”

So, you see, I have the best of what marriage can be. I have a husband who is a rock in every storm and a steadfast partner in a serious marriage. A husband who shows me he loves me with his hard work around the house and in his job, by handling our finances brilliantly, and displaying his affection frequently with a warm hug and a light kiss.

But I also get to live with a bona fide character, a best friend who constantly surprises me, who makes me laugh like nobody's business, and who honestly believes that affection is best shown by a well-timed, heartfelt wedgie.

Do I know what it means to be loved and in love? You betcha.

—
Tina Wagner Mattern

Heart and Sole

W
hen, at age twenty-five, I was about to marry my college sweetheart, there was no shortage of advice from my well-meaning Italian family on how to achieve and maintain marital bliss. Unfortunately, much of it was a bit too 1950ish for my taste and did not really fit marriage in the waning years of the twentieth century.

Have a warm supper on the table each night
.

Yeah, right. My husband and I needed to pay for our expensive college degrees; we were up to our ears in student loans. Both of us would be working for years to come, and so we'd be fortunate to find the take-out food still warm by the time our plastic forks dug into it.

Bathe the kids and put them in clean clothes before
he gets home
.

When we finally did have kids, I was quite certain we'd be challenged enough trying to coordinate who would pick them up from daycare or baseball practice. The kids would be bathed no more than three times a week — if they were lucky.

Show him you appreciate him and are interested in him
by redoing your hair and makeup at the end of the day
.

Really? I'm barely up in time to do it right before I go to work.

Keep a tidy house, vacuum and dust frequently, and
keep his closet and drawers filled with freshly laundered
clothes
.

Vacuum the house? Do his laundry?
Pffftthhh
! My vacuum would be buried under loads of laundry I had yet to fold —
my
laundry; surely Dan would do his own.

Don't
go to bed angry
.

This, I was sure, would be the most difficult bit of advice to follow. I don't easily let go of things I'm upset about. Neither does Dan, for that matter. And with all of the demands on our time, it was unlikely we would have much time to work things out before the lights were turned off for the night.

Frustrated with the seemingly impractical advice I had received, I turned to the two people who knew me best and who, coincidentally, had been married nearly fifty years: my grandparents. I figured they must have some good advice they would be willing to share — an advance on my inheritance perhaps, something I could pass on to my future children. So one day while sitting at their kitchen table as my grandmother cooked and my grandfather sat in “his” chair sipping a glass of wine, I asked the million-dollar question.

“Nonnie,” I began.

“Yes, honey,” she replied, opening the oven to baste the chicken.

“I'm looking for some advice.”

“Advice about what, honey?”

The smells were tantalizing, and I inhaled deeply. “Everyone is telling me that for my marriage to work I need to do Dan's laundry, and keep the house clean, and bathe the kids, and get dolled up for him. That will be impossible. I'll have a job outside the home, too, and won't have the time to do all that. Besides, I expect Dan to do his share of the house-work and childcare, too. So what can I do to help our marriage last like yours and Grandpa's?”

Nonnie looked lovingly at Grandpa and said, “Touch him with your toes.” Then she turned back to the oven to baste the chicken.

Touch him with my toes
?
That's
as useless as all the
other advice
I've
received
, I thought.
Or was I missing
something
?