All my father ever wanted as a young man was to marry my mother and start a family — plans that were interrupted when he was drafted into the Army during the Korean conflict.
As he served in Texas, Germany, and other parts of the world, there was only one affordable way to stay in contact: writing letters.
Every single day, seven days a week, he wrote a letter to her, and she wrote one to him.
Some letters ran four pages. Some days, they wrote two letters!
They shared their hopes and dreams, and how they missed each other so.
My father joked that they’d have four boys — a football player, a baseball player, a basketball player, and a priest (they’d have five girls, one boy, 17 grandchildren, and 11 great-grandchildren).
Their cursive handwriting was as impeccable and as artful as their words. Their letters offer a case study in the art of romance.
Romance, according to Dictionary.com, is “to court or woo romantically; treat with ardor or chivalrousness.”
“Ardor” defines my parents’ romance especially well: “great warmth of feeling; fervor; passion; intense devotion, eagerness, or enthusiasm; zeal; burning heat.”
Halfway through my father’s Army tour, my mother stopped writing to him for three weeks.
He was mortified, thinking she’d found someone else — unaware that she’d become so sick from rheumatic fever that she nearly died.
He was relieved to learn there was a reason her letters had ceased, but he agonized over her well-being until she recovered.
Finally, after two long years, he returned home. They were able to get on with their lives.
The romance my parents experienced is a dying art.
Romance is about kindness, honesty, graciousness, and affection — it’s about patience and sacrificing now to enjoy greater fulfillment later on.
It’s about trust — the sense that someone places you above all others and cares more for your needs than his or her own.
My parents really did believe that when they married, they became one under God.
They fully accepted that their commitment to each other was to “have and to hold, for better, for worse, for richer, for poorer, in sickness and in health, until death do them part.”
Some consider these dated concepts in a modern era of instant gratification, cynicism, self-centeredness, and hookup dating, but without the principles on which my parents built their love, romance cannot flourish.
My father told me that the first time he set his eyes on my mother, he knew he would marry her — his proudest achievement was that he made it happen.
I am hopeful to learn that, according to Psychology Today, nearly half of younger generations believe love at first sight is still possible.
They are romantics at heart — as we all should be!
We are all authors of our own stories, too, so why not begin writing romance into our lives?
This Valentine’s Day, turn off your devices. Gather some stationery and a pen and write to someone you love.
Maybe you’ll fail, maybe you’ll succeed, but know this: The act of writing your story is where true romance begins.
My father died four years ago, and my mother misses him desperately. But together they wrote a love story for the ages.
Young or old, any of us can still do the same.
Happy Valentine’s Day!
Find Tom Purcell’s syndicated column, humor books, and videos of his dog, Thurber, at TomPurcell.com. Email him at tom@tompurcell.com.