I must have kept every single card my
husband ever gave me in the twenty-five years we've been together:
Anniversary cards. Birthday greetings. Christmas and Easter cards
when we were engaged. Some, early on, with brief notes penned by my
husband. Others--the later ones--simply signed.
Today, I recycled them all.
And my husband did the same with the
cards I gave him.
But I did keep this note, written in my
grandmother Alice's hand...a note I discovered shortly after her death...a note that records a conversation she'd had with her husband, my grandfather.
April 28, 1991
Conversation at dinner table
Ken: (having been reading "John
Cell..." [the rest is
illegible]) said, "I could not write a book like that
now if my life depended on it."
Alice: "You probably could if
you were interested."
Ken: "Well..."
Alice: "You don't seem to be
interested in anything."
Ken: "Um..." (in consent
more or less).
Alice: "You could try."
Ken: "It just doesn't seem to
be worthwhile. Nothing is worthwhile without you."
Alice: "Well that's true for
each of us."
I can see my grandparents sitting at the kitchen
table during this exchange...my grandfather's glass of
buttermilk...their blue dishes, neatly set. I can see
their poodles beneath that table, noses poking up the tablecloth as
they beg for scraps. I can hear the clock ticking gently in the
background. I can hear the sadness in their voices as they struggle to come to terms with my grandfather's cancer.
This note I will keep, as proof of a
deep and lasting love. And if my husband and I feel the same about
each other near the end of our lives, our love and marriage will have
been a success, even without all those recycled cards to prove it.
Kelly Garriott Waite on Google+Labels: Grandparents, Great 365 Day Purge, love letters