A LESSON IN LOVE
by Marian Thomas
Throughout our nearly 59-year marriage, my husband and I frequently saw things differently.
Did our adopted daughter need more discipline or did she need more love and affection? Were writings by psychologists or psychiatrists full of insight or full of meaningless jabber? Should a church member be invited to read the scripture lesson for the day during worship, even if a poor reader (so he or she would feel included), or should only excellent readers be invited to participate (so the words would be communicated clearly)? Our conversations were sometimes argumentative, but they were always honest.
There is a Korean tradition of giving newly-weds a pair of carved wooden ducks. The ducks symbolize a couple - one has a red beak, the other a green beak. These particular ducks are said to mate for a lifetime, and are never separated. The wooden ones sit side by side on a table or chest, and if there is an issue which one person desperately needs to discuss but of which the other seems unaware, that person turns her or his duck around so the ducks are no longer facing the same direction. It’s a “silent signal” that time needs to be devoted to resolving a disagreement which has not been openly addressed. I was given a pair of the Korean ducks by a Korean friend, and they sat in our living room where we would both notice if one was turned around.
There were only two times when disagreement was so strong we had trouble communicating openly. My husband turned his duck around after I declared that we could not possibly attend his high school’s 50th anniversary reunion. We had already made a long driving trip from Kansas to Ohio and Pennsylvania, and our trips together had become exhausting for both of us as we grew older. I was not willing to take on the difficulties of another trip so soon. The burden of carrying all the equipment he needed to be able to function in motel rooms fell on me. Even the rooms designated as “handicap accessible” failed to meet his specific needs. It’s hard to believe now, but I can’t even remember what it was that caused me to turn my duck around once. Sometimes failing memory as we age can be a blessing!
One cannot go through fifty-nine years with another person without getting to know them very well, and yet some aspects always remained a mystery: where did he get his inner strength to keep going when he got polio at fifteen? Why did he mistrust doctors and psychiatrists? Why
was he never able to say “I love you” other than in writing? Despite these mysteries, I knew beyond a doubt that he loved me. He had paid for me to go to graduate school; he had agreed that we should adopt a Korean child “to make me happy.” I had given birth to two boys, and loved them both, but I wanted to have a daughter too, and the only way to be sure a third child would be a girl was to adopt one. He encouraged me in my career as a free-lance musician, and helped me make tightly wound loops for each of the 183 strings used in the harpsichord I built.
When our eldest was college-bound, I looked for a full-time job to help pay the high costs, and found that the preschool where I taught music two mornings a week needed a full-time teacher. My husband was out of town when I found out about the job, and without consulting him I
signed up for that job. When I told him, he hit the roof (not me) and said working all day with preschool children would not use the skills I had developed over the years, and he was so up-set with my decision that I changed my mind and backed out of the job. My husband had no way of knowing that only a few weeks later my dream job would land in my lap unexpectedly, and led to fifteen happy years as organist and choir director and adjunct faculty in a seminary where I worked with college graduates in the field I loved. It was his expectations of what I could achieve that propelled me into that position.
When we shared a final half an hour with each other in the Emergency Room, did any of the disagreements, different ways of looking at life, or disappointments come to mind as I held his hand and sang the love song I had chosen as “our song?” No. It was enough just to be with him, share a beloved Psalm, and wait for our children to get there. The last words I said to him were, “Thank you for being good to me.” Those words were spoken spontaneously, proving that love can be expressed in myriad ways, and can be recognized if one is open to receiving that love.
MARIAN THOMAS says: I am starting a new adventure by moving to a Life Plan Community in Oberlin, Ohio, where there are lots of retired musicians with whom I enjoy making music. I brought my piano and harpsichord with me, and am teaching music to the preschool children who come to the Early Learning Center within this community. I published a biography of my mother and will be writing a memoir of my life as well as making new friends and keeping in touch with old friends and colleagues in the Kansas City metro.
