With all of our focus on how to make your wedding special, we thought it was important to highlight some ways to make your marriage awesome, too. Introducing “Snapshot of a Marriage,” a series from contributor Emily Westbrooks, who interviews couples on some of their secrets for a strong and successful marriage.
More than 70 years ago, David was looking for a date to take to a friend’s wedding. He asked Daisy, a classmate of his sister, but she had to turn him down. The reason? She didn’t have a dress to wear! Luckily, David’s sister loaned Daisy a gown, and it’s a good thing she did: Daisy and David have been together ever since.
Shortly after they became a couple, David was headed off to fight in World War II. Before he left for basic training, he told Daisy, “I’ll be going into the Army soon and we’re going to get engaged before I leave.” David left New York and headed to basic training in Florida. When he got news that he was being sent to Germany, Daisy boarded a train for her first trip outside New York state. She arrived in Florida and the couple were married in a civil ceremony, sealing the deal with a $1 ring from the local five and dime.
Two and a half years later, David came home from the war, making the long journey by ship. Like many soldiers, he passed the time playing games of craps – but David got lucky, winning enough money to buy his bride the ring he knew she deserved. And when he returned, the couple had a second wedding to match the new ring, with a small Jewish ceremony their families could take part in. “My sister-in-law loaned me her wedding gown, my mother made a little wedding party in the apartment, and the rabbi lived in the same building so he married us.”
“When I got married,” says Daisy, “my mother said to me, Your husband comes first because he is the breadwinner. Today I would say it should be a two way street. I like today’s society better than mine, it’s more equal.”
And Daisy hasn’t passed on her mother’s advice to the three daughters she and David have. Instead, Daisy says it’s about patience, compromise, and a sweet gesture here and there. “You give a little bit, your spouse gives a little bit, it’s compromise. You work at it every day. Even though we’re married seventy years, if I see a little card for my hubby, I leave it on the bed.”
David agrees, “It’s all what you make out of a marriage.”
And Daisy and David can certainly be very proud of what they’ve made of theirs!
