True Love Waits

"True love waits," is the name of an old song from my younger years, plus more recently a church related program aimed at encouraging young people to hold off and wait for the real thing.  I never dreamed it was applicable to a senior citizen.

Saundra and I went steady in high school.  I wrote her poetry and sang her songs.  We were inseparable.  When I went off to college I did the noble thing and broke off with her so she could enjoy what should have been the best of her high school time.  She thought she was releasing me so I could get the most out of my college time.  We were so young - - - so naïve.

We both had marriages to someone else totaling over 25 years, but both ended up alone.  That's another story.  We attended the funeral of a common friend and were overjoyed to find each other there.  She came by my mother's house following the funeral and we had a chance to talk over old times.  The years melted away and it was as if no time had passed at all.  She still knew me better than I knew myself, and I her.  It was a magical afternoon.

Once again distance intervened.  It appeared the past would be repeated.  She lived in Oklahoma and I in New Mexico.  We wrote each other a letter upon returning home.  Thinking it would just be the one letter, we were surprised when they continued to became a daily routine with occasional phone calls as well.  She asked if I still wrote poetry so I penned some for her.  She was dealing with the loss of her mother, and of a baby to crib death.  She had not gotten any support on dealing with these life-shaking blows and was not handling them well.  She found in me a listener who understood and who could say things that helped ease the pain.

I had lost both my father and my brother, not to mention my job.  Piled on top were a number of other difficulties it serves no purpose to enumerate.  I'm ashamed to admit I even got to the point where I considered a solution no one should ever entertain, even for a moment.  But there she was, and she understood.  She too said the right things. She cared deeply, even after all these years.  We had never forgotten, nor had we lost what we had so many years ago.

She moved to Dallas and I courted her there.  Romantic dinners, buggy rides in the West End, it didn't matter what we did it always ended up in us talking, sharing - - - communicating.  Thirty years is a long time to catch up on. 

Or maybe we didn't need to catch up.  Maybe it was better picking up where we left off, high school sweethearts still in love; older now but much, much wiser.  I penned a little poem that talked about a couple shown as shadows on the wall.  The fire of youth had died down, but the embers glowed brightly, and it's the embers that give off the heat, and last long after the fire has died down.  Maybe that said it all.