My grandparents’ 65th wedding anniversary would have been this past Wednesday, February 15th. Unfortunately, however, my grandmother passed away in October after a decade of struggling with Alzheimers’. I guess I was still pretty young when she started exhibiting warning signs, so my main memories of her are from my elementary school years, and include her insistence at me watching a Shirley Temple film with her every time she came over- “but GRANDMA. I’ve already SEEEEEEN this one!” “It’s okay! It’s a good one!”

As she got sicker, my grandpa became the greatest example of love I’d ever seen— stubborn about giving her up to a nursing home, but visiting her daily for years once he did, even just to sit with her and feed her as she became unable to talk coherently in her final years.

At times not recognizing him, and longterm memory lost, one day my grandma turned to him and said, “You’re a nice man… but when are you going to marry me?” While I imagine that shook him pretty hard to hear that, my grandfather simply planned for a priest to come to the nursing home, invited his 8 kids and many grandkids and great grandkids, and they renewed their vows. 

At Christmastime he told me that, before she took a turn for the worse, he had wanted to throw a party this year to celebrate their 65 years together.  I just wrote him a card this morning to let him know I was thinking of them on their anniversary, telling him a little bit about my life and hoping to see him soon. I found myself unexpectedly in tears as I signed my name.

After my grandmother passed away, my mother told me a story of how, in Grandma’s final weeks, Grandpa showed up to the nursing home one day, kissed Grandma on the lips and said, “she never did forget how to kiss!” 

What a love story. Thank you, Grandma and Grandpa. I love you.