A Valentine Day Rambling

What do the long-wed folk do?*

What do the long-wed folk do
To pluck up the heart and get through?

The seniors and gray-haired folk
With thoughts that oft wander to and fro
Have ways known to their own folk

That young weds don’t know

When all the doldrums begin
What keeps each of them in his skin?
What ancient native custom provides the needed glow?
Oh, what do long-wed folk do?
Do you know?

(*The verses above are a take-off from “What Do the Simple Folks Do?" sung by Richard Burton & Julie Andrews in the Broadway play Camelot.)

A Thrift Shop Find

It was about 8:00 in the evening and we have just finished dinner. The quiet swishing of the dishwasher could hardly be heard. Our usual routine has been to settle down to watching “Death in Paradise” which is our Wednesday night BBC whodunit. But tonight is special.

Over the weekend, I managed to drag Don to the thrift store I regularly go to in Burlingame. Rummaging through the bottom shelf in the kitchen section, I spotted a box that said “Espresso Coffeemaker.” In it was a brand new, never used, still in original packing Espresso maker. Not quite a Sierra Madre treasure find, but pretty close to it, as far as this cheapskate was concerned. I paid all of $15 for it, took it home and within an hour I was figuring out how it operated. A few minutes later that night Don and I had our first, heavenly, home-brewed Cappuccino. We were in our glory!

Here we were sipping our frothy coffee and in between sips we were talking as if we were 20-year olds on their first date.  I spooned some froth and savored the white stuff that hinted of the espresso underneath. I threw a forward glance at the kind face of this man I’ve been sharing my life with for the last 41 years. My little pea brain reminded me of how Don and I have become so much like each other through the years. He has always told people he learned to drink coffee from me. I would counter by saying that I had to convert from being a coke to a Pepsi drinker when I married him. As we talked over our cups of coffee, I realized how far he has come. He’s become somewhat of a coffee connoisseur. He can tell if the coffee is French pressed or drip brewed, and whether it is Sumatra, French Roast, or one of his favorites – Starbuck’s Blonde. I get a kick out of hearing him give his order for “a tall Blonde.” Through the years we have changed, compromised and learned new things about and from each other. Learning to drink coffee and enjoying it is one of his; learning theology and getting acquainted with men named Tertulian, Athanasius and Polycarp is one of mine. There have been many other trade-offs between us through the years.

What do old married folk talk about?

A close friend asked us one day what Don and I talked about, having spent so much time of our lives together. This has been specially true after our children married and left the family home. Nowadays we’re all by ourselves in our little condominium which we share with a 32-year old turtle, a 12-year old gold fish and Hank the Cat that we “inherited” from Matthew and Helen. (You know about parents “inheriting” pets from their children, don’t you?)

What was going through our minds as we sipped our cappuccino together? Shared memories. The cups of cappuccino triggered memories of learning how to make espresso coffees about five years ago when we were volunteer interim directors of a Christian library in Berlin. We learned how to

make gourmet coffee and how a public library operated. We met wonderful volunteers who worked with us, putting in unpaid hours making coffee, lending out books, reading to little children, talking to people, listening to their stories. We remember sitting in a classroom with 9 other students from 8 different countries taking a 2-week intensive course to learn the German language. They were mostly in their early 20’s. Don and I could have passed for their grandparents. We were bonded by the common torture of the very difficult declensions, pronunciations and conjugations of the language. When the course was over for us, the young folks said they were saddened to lose us. A couple of months later, Diane, who was from France and Carlos who was from Columbia, came to see us in the library to bid goodbye. They were going home to their countries.

Don and I talked about how we found the quaint, little café that had parlor-like sofas and dainty little curtains on one of the side streets off of Haupstrasse in Berlin. That was a time when Don and I would wake up feeling like we couldn’t face another day. We had work-related problems and tension that seemed insurmountable. We took one of the sitting areas and ordered our cappuccino. When the clerk came back, she had a tray with our coffee cups complete with little doilies on the saucer and cute tiny cookies. I felt like I had been warmly welcomed to an old friend’s home. We sat there for a while and between sips of coffee and bites of cookies, we tried to sort out our thoughts and calm our nerves. Somehow by the time we had to go back to work, we felt much better.

Sometimes I read Facebook posts of wives and husbands extolling the virtues of their spouses. They say wonderful, romantic things that starry-eyed lovers say to each other.  Don and I have never been able to say such things. In fact, when we got married he asked me how I wanted him to call me.   I said, “Raquel.” That’s my name.  So, we have always been Don and Raquel to each other. We are both so unromantic; we deserve each other.  But we spend a lot of time talking over coffee or walking in the Botanical Garden at Golden Gate Park discussing Kafka or the Gulag Archipelago or Calvinism, Armenianism, Tertulian, Chesterton or Augustine and still share the wonder that a newly-read book brings or the serene picture a flock of ducks gliding in the waters of Stow Lake offers.

A Happy Valentine greeting to you lovers, young and old!