"Marie and I love each other. We met June 15, 1946, got engaged on July 27, and were married three months later. We’ll have our 69th anniversary this coming October. Doing something for Marie is like doing something for myself. When she cuts a grapefruit in two, she always looks carefully at each piece and then gives the larger piece to me. I try to give it back, of course, but she won’t take it. We’ve been together a long time and have always tried to do the right thing for each other. One thing that destroys a relationship---any relationship, not just a marriage---is selfishness.
"You can make a marriage work if you try. I don’t see why people leave after they have a falling out. Almost everybody you meet is a human. *laughs* We all make mistakes. The next person you’re with will have faults too. When we make a mistake, we just need to correct it.
"People can learn to care about each other whether they start out that way or not. When I was growing up, I was the oldest of four children. Our mother was in poor health, so her spinster sister moved in to help take care of us. She was a stenographer and looked about like what you’d expect: plain and sensible. Well, my mother passed away not long before I finished high school. After things settled down a little, my father and aunt decided it didn’t look right for her to still be living in the house and them not married. They didn't love each other---it was a marriage of convenience---but they got married anyway; it was the right thing to do. She did kind things for him, he did kind things for her, and in time the two of them fell in love. It was a beautiful thing to see. If you make up your mind to do the right thing by each other and not to be selfish, you’ll end up caring for each other."
"You can make a marriage work if you try. I don’t see why people leave after they have a falling out. Almost everybody you meet is a human. *laughs* We all make mistakes. The next person you’re with will have faults too. When we make a mistake, we just need to correct it.
"People can learn to care about each other whether they start out that way or not. When I was growing up, I was the oldest of four children. Our mother was in poor health, so her spinster sister moved in to help take care of us. She was a stenographer and looked about like what you’d expect: plain and sensible. Well, my mother passed away not long before I finished high school. After things settled down a little, my father and aunt decided it didn’t look right for her to still be living in the house and them not married. They didn't love each other---it was a marriage of convenience---but they got married anyway; it was the right thing to do. She did kind things for him, he did kind things for her, and in time the two of them fell in love. It was a beautiful thing to see. If you make up your mind to do the right thing by each other and not to be selfish, you’ll end up caring for each other."
Click HERE to listen to Bryan's version of I Can't Stop Loving You, with words written especially for his beloved Marie. Marie is suffering from Alzheimer's and was unavailable for this interview.
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