THE SONIC BOOMER
As promised in a previous column, I would like to share a letter my father wrote to my mother on the occasion of their 70th anniversary. At the time, they were both in assisted living and, as if that weren’t sad enough, the pandemic prevented them from having any visitors or leaving the premises.
From his room in a separate building (dad had more health issues than mom), he wrote this letter and had a staff member deliver it to her;
“Dearest Marjorie,
“Thank you for 70 of the best years of my life. And I mean it.
“You have been so good to me and made my life worth living.”
(I pause here to mention that my father was a Depression-era kid with an alcoholic, physically abusive father and four rowdy brothers, one of whom was killed by a delivery truck at age 5.)
“There is no one luckier than I’ve been. I must tell you how sorry I am for any miseries I’ve caused you along the way. You never deserved my failings because you are so good and sweet and gentle in all you’ve ever done. I didn’t deserve a wife as nice as you are.”
(I pause again to mention that my mother was also a Depression-era kid who lived on a farm with 10 siblings, two of whom died as infants, with chores from dawn to dusk, but whose parents were irrepressibly in love. This love caused her to have a completely different outlook on life.)
The letter goes on, “And thank you for our lovely children. You did good! Happy anniversary, sweetheart. I hope our next 70 years are as nice as these first 70 have been. Your hubby for 70 blessed years, Emmett. PS: I owe you a great dinner in a fine establishment if we ever get out of this damnable quarantine.”
I think part of the sadness of growing old and dying is that people tend to remember us only in our declining years and talk only of whatever morose circumstances took us from this earth.
So, instead, I try to remember the backyard barbecue with my dad surreptitiously placing a rubber hot dog into my best friend’s bun and covering it with ketchup.
Or the time he stretched miles of string across the entrance to our living room in a spider-web pattern as a “reminder” to us kids that we had to take our shoes off because opulent gray wall-to-wall carpeting had just been installed.
Or my mom at her sewing machine, making us school clothes and theatrical costumes that were the envy of the other children and teachers alike.
When I sift through these memories, it seems they have randomly cemented themselves in my brain, containing no life lessons or other real significance that sets them apart from the other days of my youth. Yet together, they have quilted themselves together in what can only be described as “a happy childhood.”
So mom marrying dad and sticking with him gave everyone in our family “a life worth living.” I’d say I’m grateful, but the word isn’t big enough.
