October 1994 – Sincerely Sire Newsletter

 

LOVE STORY

 

I didn't know I loved her the moment I set eyes on her - - - it took me until the next morning.  It took her five years to love me back.  No, I'm not talking about my old girl friend.  I'm talkin' 'bout my baby.  My woman.  My wife.  Rosemarie.  Roe for short. 

 

December 30th will be our twenty-second anniversary.  We were married a few days after I asked her to marry me in Wilber (population 1200), Nebraska.  We made our vows before a justice of the peace at the county court house.  I guess you could say we eloped.

 

I first met Roe in 1970.  I was twenty years young.  My best friend, Dennis, asked me if I'd like to meet his cousin, Rosemarie.  She had just moved here with her family from New York.  (Incidentally, Dennis had been my best friend since the first grade, which makes me think I was destined to marry Roe from day one.) I had nothing else in particular to do, so I went over to his house where she was sitting at the kitchen table drinking coffee with her mother. 

 

Dennis had to go somewhere, so I was left alone to talk/spar with the two of them for a couple of hours.  I thought I was a pretty smooth operator back then, but they cut me to ribbons with their brash wit and heavy New York accents.  I remember leaving that day wondering if everyone from New York was as cocky as the dynamic duo.

 

But the next morning I was in big trouble.  To my surprise, I woke up thinking about Rosemarie.  In fact, I couldn't stop thinking about her.  I could see her sitting at the kitchen table with her soft auburn hair cascading over her shoulders down to the small of her back.  I saw her sipping her coffee, tossing her head back and laughing.  So what did I care that she was laughing at me?  I liked the way she laughed.  This was a woman I wanted.  She was, I realized, my kind of gal.  I would show her I was not a man to be trifled with.  I was not a man to be laughed at.

 

The next day I persuaded Dennis to visit his cousin again and take me with him.  (I didn't happen to mention

that I was in love with her.)  As soon as we got there she started laughing at me again. I kept trying to be cool, but she just kept laughing.  Apparently I was a pretty funny guy.  I spent the next five years trying to change the laughing to loving.  I asked her out, but she just laughed.  I sent her flowers and she laughed.  I wrote her love letters and both her and her mother laughed. 

 

She laughed till I cried and finally gave up.  Many months passed.  I got myself another girlfriend.  I went to Europe with my new girlfriend.  We had a really great time.  Next, my new girlfriend got married - - - to someone else. 

 

Needless to say, I wasn't laughing.  But then, one evening, a rather interesting thing happened on my way to Heartbreak Hotel.  I had just returned home from watching the George Foreman - Muhammad Ali fight.  I walked in the door and there Rosemarie was, again.  All five feet, eight inches of her, sprawled out on the living room carpet, gazing passionately into the glowing fireplace (or was that a halo around her head?).    

 

I took one look and thought - - - No way.  Not again.  Not this time. What the heck was she doing here anyway?  Had she come to torture me?  Turns out she had gotten in to a giant argument with her parents and had come to stay with her cousin Dennis.  And, as fate would have it, Dennis and I were sharing a house at the time. 

 

I made up my mind to ignore her.  And I did.  Or at least she thought I did . . . And then a miracle happened.  She started loving me.  To this day, I do not know why, but she stopped laughing and started loving.

 

I asked her if she wanted to go with me to visit my parents in Nebraska for Christmas.  She said she couldn't.  She had to work.  I said, "Quit."  So she picked up the phone and did. 

 

We drove to Nebraska in a beat up '62 Volkswagen and stayed with my mom and dad in this old farm house out in the middle of nowhere.  It was there that I got down on my knees and asked her to marry me.  She told me she wanted to sleep on it and that she would give me her answer soon.

 

The next morning we took a walk along the old farm road leading away from the house.  We walked for quite some time hearing only the crunching of the freshly fallen snow beneath our feet and our own rhythmic breathing. It was very cold, but the sun had burned its way through the clouds and found us just in time as she put her hand in mine and said, "Yes, my darling, I’ll marry you."

 

Five days later we were hitched, and twenty-two years later we still are.

 

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