I have to say that one of the things that saddens me most is when couples decide to throw in the towel. There are many reasons …. and I don’t want to place judgment on anyone … yet the fact that two people who promised to love and cherish each other are going their separate ways hurts my heart.
I have many WWII veteran friends; my friend Marion and his wife Bernita have been married 64 years. Knowing this, I thought he could be someone who could give my blog readers marriage insight. Here is what Marion said:
My Bernita, at twelve years of age, saw her parents divorced in 1937. Her mother struggled to support her and her younger sister.
In April of 1943, Bernita graduated from high school and she could not seek a vocation of her liking because there was a war going on, World War II. Bernita had to go 60 miles to Evansville. At that time girls had to go into the War Production Industry. With fifty other girls, she made 50 caliber machine gun bullets. She learned at a young age how to support herself.
I faced combat in war. I was shot down and became a Prisoner of War in Germany. There was hunger, no shelter, sleeping in fence rows and forests. Each of us survived our situation. We met in August 1942, then after two years absent from one another we came back together on June 14, 1945. Our love was so deeply embedded nothing could put us apart.
With what we went through in the young years of our lives. We stood before our church alter July 6, 1945, swearing by a covenant before God, till death do us part, that we could endure, that our marriage would endure.
We started out in a three room apartment. All we had was a bedroom suite, living room furnishings and kitchen dining table, and a kerosene cook stove. Kitchen shelves were made by orange crates. Toilet facilities were at the end of a 100 foot path out the back kitchen door. There was running water, but 12 feet outside the kitchen door was our pump with water from a cistern brought into house with three gallon bucket.
With all this, brings us here 64 years of marriage … our journey in life brought us to where we are today.
Maybe it was the era of time and hardship we lived that made us willing to tough things out. It gave us determination to want to survive, want to live, want to be together in our journey in life.
By hard work and determination, we worked together to change the lifestyle we came through our developing years. We wanted to make a new cultured life, yet we also merged and molded some of the old conservative traditions into a present day lifestyle.
My best advice is to pray, live the good life, be happy, and laugh a lot.
Marion.
I totally agree. These days too many couples go into marriage with the thought that if it doesn’t work out they’ll just get divorced. They quit too soon. I’ve been married almost 27 years now…been through just about everything a couple can go through, but my husband and I just kept working at it…sometimes it was very difficult, but we made it and are so thankful. I love him more today than I ever thought possible. Thanks to a lot of hard work and God!!!