Achieving longevity in marriage
Just 6 percent of U.S. married couples reach the milestone of 50 years of marriage. What possibly could be the secret?
Why not ask a half dozen of these folks what it takes to stay with one person for that long when it took the late comedian Johnny Carson four marriages to total 50 years.
Ed Zeglen of Clarksville, married for nearly 56 years to his wife, Sandy, breaks into a comedic shtick when asked what has placed their marriage among the 6 percent.
Zeglen said splitting the house in half, ala “The War of the Roses,” has worked well. He’s messy and somewhat of a packrat. She’s neither.
“Usually people downsize when they retire; we upsized. We added a 20-by-30-foot addition,” Zeglen said, in his best Henny Youngman impersonation. “We need our own space, and after 50 years, I think we deserve it.”
In the case of this pair, finding one’s opposite could be the key. Ed is larger than life, a joker, and for decades the go-to guy when anyone needed a Santa Claus in the area. Sandy, as his Mrs. Claus, is much more introverted, said son, Mike, “but somehow, they made it work.”
“I listen to him, he listens to me and then we both do what we’re gonna do, but at least we listen,” Sandy quipped, holding her own against her husband’s comedic timing, “I lost all of my Catholic girlfriends when I got with Ed because they were jealous. I should have kept the girls.”
It was Ed who took notice of how many couples in their immediate families had longevity in their marriages.
“We were talking one day and it hit me that there have been a lot of us,” he said.
When he began writing it down what he found was quite interesting.
Sandy is one of four sisters, each married for at least 50 years to the same person, as were the girls’ late parents, August and Pauline Guerrieri Tassone, who lived to see 55 years together. Sandy’s late maternal grandparents, Paul and Lelah Guerrieri, hit 60 years of marriage.
Likewise, Ed’s mom and dad, the late George and Agnes Lucostic Zeglen, reached the 54-year mark. Ed’s late sister, Antoinette, and her husband, John Skobel, made it to 61 years and Ed’s late brother, John “Yush” Zeglen, and his wife, Margie, hit the half-century mark.
Dancing was high on the list of the things that connected Margie to her husband, she said.
“We just loved each other a lot and we loved to dance. Any place where they had dancing we went to,” Margie said.
Unlike his brother, Ed, John, a coal miner by trade, was on the quiet side, Margie said, adding “Eddie talked enough for both of them.”
“The first time I saw (John) it seems like he caught my eye. His sister lived across the street and he’d come to visit her,” she said. “He had dark hair and blue eyes. His blue eyes caught my eye right away.”
Sandy’s sister, Lillian “Lill” Oktela, laughed when she said “patience” kept she and husband, Bill, together for 55 years and counting.
“I think we don’t have too much in common, (other than) the house and kids,” she chuckled, before adding. “Bill sleeps on the enclosed deck.”
A military wife for more than 20 years, Lill said it seemed like every time they got settled they were moving again. It led for an interesting time for the girl who had never traveled out of Republic, where she grew up before she married.
“He crossed Route 40 to get me,” she joked.
At two years older than her husband, Lill said it was Bill’s persistence that won her over but agreed he’d “probably have his own (version) of the story” to tell.
Sandy’s sister, Lucretia Cowger of Sandy Plains, was quick with an answer to the secret of her marriage of 55 years to her now-deceased husband, Robert.
“It was respecting and loving each other and having only three people in the marriage: Bob, myself and God,” she said.
Lucretia met Bob when she walked passed him as he was trimming trees. That first meeting didn’t go well when Bob’s flirting didn’t quite work out.
“He offered to give me directions and I said I knew the way. When he asked where I was going, I said, ‘church’ and he said, ‘Yeah, I bet,’ so I told him to just forget it,” Lucretia said.
Later on, Bob stopped by Feelo’s Restaurant in Republic where she worked as a waitress and it wasn’t long before he’d won her over.
“It was the best thing that ever happened in my life,” she said. “I thank God every day I had 55 years with him. When someone like my husband dies you realize that type of love is forever. It doesn’t die with them.”
For Paulette Jesko, Sandy’s youngest sister, there isn’t a specific secret to her 50-year marriage to husband Jack, rather more of a well-honed recipe.
“It is a lot of give and take. We never go to bed mad. He never leaves for work without kissing me. He kisses me goodnight and he calls me two times a day to tell me he loves me and I say the same,” she said. “We’ve had our rough times and there were a lot of them over 50 years, but we made it. When we had our ups and downs, we didn’t give up. We were never willing to do that. We fought for each other.”
Together as a couple since junior high school, Paulette said, “You can’t take all of the time. You have to be willing to give also. That’s the story of us.”
Meeting when she was only 13 years old, Jack left her notes every day and finally she responded. What did they say? Paulette’s not telling.
She instead shared the story when Jack met her parents the first time.
“He used to drive down the road passed our house but never stop. My dad was a joker. One day, he ran after his car with a baseball bat and yelled, ‘We see you,'” she said. “The next time, Jack stopped.”
Paulette said her parents consulted with an authority when it came to whether Jack would work out, and it was none other than her brother-in-law, Ed.
“There’s no one quite like Ed. My mom found out where Jack was from and she asked Ed how the Jesko family was,” Paulette said. “He got the Zeglen approval so I guess I can thank Ed for my 50 years. I think I’ll keep him for another 50.”
Speaking with halves of these pairs it became evident there isn’t one answer to the question of how to make a marriage last. Each story was special, but it wouldn’t hurt to say, “I love you,” more, keep a space of your own, listen but don’t compromise everything, and don’t forget to dance.