Walter and Mary Bieri

More Advice From Long Married Couples     The advice given in this series of blogs comes from a study of couples married 50 years or longer……

You have to really like each other. That means being able to listen to each other no matter what the subject.

Always be willing to walk away when a subject becomes too heated, but always be willing to come back to it when you are both calm.

Never call each other names when you are angry. Just say, I am angry right now.

Love must be nurtured. Kindness and respect are a part of the nurturing.

Share common goals and find common interests.

Give each other plenty of space to grow and accept each other just the way they are.

Share responsibility and care of the house, children, and the relationship.

Everyone has problems. Stay together and work them out.

Agree that it’s okay to disagree.

Talk things out and never give up.

Dave and Jacque Leek

Secrets of a Long Marriage from Couples Married 50 Years or More

I love my husband and he loves me. We work together. We talk things out, even though sometimes it may not be a quiet discussion.

You only get out of a marriage what you put into it.

Be individuals. Give each other space.

Have fun together and never get too old to hold hands.

Never give advice unless it’s asked for and then be careful not to tell him/her what to do.

Take responsibility for your own feelings, needs, and happiness.

Friends will always let you down. Don’t be fragile. Toughen up.

Never stop learning listening skills. Be aware of subjects you react to.

Do everything you can to express your love. Never let a day go without telling each other, “I love you.”

Always make marriage and family a top priority.

Gene and Georgia Schroeder

Couples Married 50 Years Or Longer

“We’re seeing more and more couples that have lasted where friendship is one of the big factors. If they’re from a close family, that provides a huge social network that contributes to marital longevity. Couples have more to draw on and more commitment to the greater good of the family.”

That comment comes from Todd Migliaccio, California State University, Sacramento sociology professor. My husband, Everett, and I were one of the dozens of couples married more than 50 years interviewed by Professor Migliaccio. Interestingly, he was not married at the time.

My own mother died four years before she and my dad reached their 50th anniversary, but many older couples reach that milestone. Presently, more than half of American marriages have lasted more than 15 years according to census figures. About 30 percent of married couples celebrate 25 years together. Experts theorize about what makes it possible to make a marriage last. The true answers come from those who year in and year out through good times and bad, find ways to make their marriages work.

Look forward to future blog posts giving answers by those who have made marriage work. I welcome pictures of people who have been married 50 years or longer with their names and wedding dates.

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Contests–Worthwhile or Waste of Time

Maybe I needed to boost my self esteem and confidence, but I had an insatiable attraction to competition as a high school student. As freshmen, my friend and I won the traditional freshman/sophomore debate, the first time it had been won by freshmen. I won the local Lion’s Club speech contest and went on to the county event where I came in second. The winner went on to compete at the state level. A winning essay sent me to Sacramento as my high school’s female representative to the YMCA Model Legislature where I met California Governor Earl Warren. Another winning essay resulted in a visit to the Freedom Train which was traveling around the country at that time.

College dampened my interest in competition, but every now and then as an adult I have entered writing contests. Rarely have I gotten even an honorable mention. I dismissed my lack of success to unfair judging. LOL.

This week it happened. My NCPA colleagues voted my “elevator speech” first place in a contest they sponsored. Here it is. What do you think?

“Give your relationship skills a rating. Do you kiss frogs and hope for a miracle? Go on a lifetime search for a “soul mate”? Become a therapist? Open my book, Becoming Soul Mates at any two pages and find something to talk about with your special person. Your relationship skills will soar.”

That is an elevator speech!

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celebrating our 58th anniversary in 2013

Does Your Lover Feel Loved?

A Good Lover:
         has  the ability: to laugh, play, comment

         skills: of listening, hearing, understanding

         likes: touching, hugging, kissing

         notices, compliments, admires

How often do you tell your special person, “I love you”? If that is something you feel but never think to say, make it a prioity to remember to say it every day. Eventually, it becmes natural to say it when you get up in the morning and when you go to bed at night. You cannot say it too often. Touching, hugging, kissing come naturally when you love and feel loved.

Talking and listening skills are a part of noticeing and caring. Very few people have good listening skills so many people feel misunderstood and not heard. When your lover believes you understand him/her, she/he feel loved.

Noticeing, complimenting, and admiring are like the icing on the cake. When a woman proudly shares with her friends something special her mate has done, he feels ten feet tall. When he shows his admiration of her in front of friends, she feels adored.

The best place to start is to say, “I love you,” not once but many times. If you don’t feel loved, let your mate know how good it feels when he/she tells you. Touch him and smile when you respond, “I love you, too.”

So many places to see. So much beauty to enjoy. So little time to see it all. Yet we find ourselves drawn back to a few places over and over. We have recently returned from our third visit to the Marriott Star Pass Resort. This majestic desert retreat guards the Tucson Mountain Park with its towering saguaro and 20,000 acres full of desert wildlife.

Mild weather draws many guests to Tucson, Arizona in the winter. We have been there twice in August, the monsoon season. We save our money and our Marriott credit card points to make it happen. We love the continental breakfast with its steel cut oatmeal, choice of fruits, smoked salmon, cheese, nuts of all kinds and a variety of tasty fresh baked pastry. Coffee and juice are included. Our waiter remembered our names and even what we had ordered the day before. She surprised us by asking, “Do you want your apples peeled and cut again this morning?”

Our room had a fantastic view of the desert and the city of Tucson in the distance. At night we sat on the Salud Terrace to watch the sun go down and the Tucson lights magically turn the distant horizon into a fairyland of sparkling color. Another night as we returned to the hotel along the dark winding road, we rounded the corner and two young coyote cubs frolicked in our headlights.

The serenity of Star Pass and its desert wildlife has drawn us back ever since we discovered it when we stayed at the Star Pass timeshare many years ago. We hope to return again when we have saved more money and Marriott credit card points.

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Blame and defending will never lead to resolution of conflicts. People on the defensive take in very little information. We grow up learning to deny and defend. Common parental messages begin with the words, “you need to” ; “you didn’t” ; “you should have”. We grow up learning to deny and defend.

I have one brother and while we were growing up he constantly got in trouble. As a result he got blamed for things he didn’t do. Denial became his first response whether guilty or not. I was the good girl and never lied.

I had a book, “The Little Red Hen” which I loved. One day I had a safety pin in my hand while reading the book. I scratched the letters of the title on the cover. A few days later my mother, who taught us to always take good care of our things, noticed the artistic enhancement on my book.

“Who scratched this book?” she asked in a tone that scared me. “Did you, Elva?” “No,” I answered immediately, instantly terrified that I would go to Hell for lying. My mother turned toward my brother. He answered with an emphatic, “no!” She continued, “Don’t lie, Edward.” “I didn’t do it,” he repeated. To my horror he got spanked for lying. I was doomed to six months of terrible guilt and fear. When I could stand it no longer, I tearfully confessed.

You can understand why my brother grew up skilled at being defensive. One of the first skills learned in communication is “do not blame, do not defend”. Thus, the rule, use  “I” instead of “you”. When you own the problem it becomes much easier for your partner to listen and not defend. He/she may not completely trust you, but inch by inch you learn it is worth taking a chance.

It may be unrealistic to use this incident as an example, but let’s go there. My Mom might have said, “I have a problem with books being damaged and I am wondering how this book got scratched.” I think I could have had the courage to tell my mother I didn’t mean to damage the book. I just wasn’t thinking.” She never would have spanked me, and I would have prevented weeks of sleepless nights and nightmares about going to Hell. The lesson here is you will be far more likely to solve a conflict if you start with “I have a problem with…….”

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One night I had a dream. Everett and I fell off a cliff on to a remote snow covered peak with precarious footing. We were terrified we were going to die. Sure enough, the snow broke off again hurtling us through the air. We yelled goodby to each other. This is it!

We landed softly in snow, surprised to be alive. We carefully worked our way down the mountain. As we came around a bend we met three people climbing in the other direction. One wore a forest ranger uniform. They listened nonchalantly to our story. Clearly, they didn’t believe us, but we figured if they could get up this far, we could get down the rest of the way.

Lesson from the dream: We can learn from other people even if they refuse to learn from us.

If you want to become soul mates, stay open to learning!

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Peace in the Valley

When I was a little girl, I heard a barber shop quartet sing an old hymn called, “Peace in the Valley.” I remember the bass singer singing the last line of the song, “There will be peace in the valley some day.” Coming to our timeshare at 1862 David Wally’s Resort reminds me of that song. Sitting on the deck of the Aurora Building at Wally’s Hot Springs, I marvel at the variety of birds at home here. All sizes and colors, they sing hidden in tree foliage. They hop merrily across the grass or soar in the sky. One year a robin made its nest near the second floor balcony. The verdant Carson Valley show-cases the life cycles of many varieties of nature. It is a nature lover’s paradise.   

This week gave us a great gift of the kind of weather natives described as perfect weather. Lounging on pool side chairs after sitting in hot mineral pools with interesting people from faraway places brought sheer pleasure. I feel fortunate to get away from the pressures of the city and find peace in the valley with my lover.

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The Four-Eyed Frog in Gualala rescued Joel Crockett, a workaholic who loves to play, from having to choose to do one or the other. As a teenager, Joel worked as manager of an amusement park in Venice, California. He went to work at 6 a.m., worked four hours, took four hours off for lunch to go surfing and then back to work for four more hours.

Joel never lost his love of the ocean. Eventually, he figured out a way to combine that love with his love of books, acting and community involvement by starting a book store in Gualala. Joel and his brother, Jeremy, beat all odds and have kept the Four-Eyed Frog going since 2003.

“I learned to read when I was four years old,” says Joel. “I was painfully shy and I escaped into books. To own and run a book store blended my wife, Linda’s dreams with mine. We leased property in Cypress Village while the center was still in the planning stage. We began brainstorming names for our new store. Many independent book stores have critter names. Linda and I had a running joke about frogs. We realized that a frog cannot read without glasses so we decided to give him glasses and call him “The Four-Eyed Frog.”

The Four-Eyed Frog opened its doors in November 2003. It quickly became a hub of community activity. Joel, who had never acted before has had parts in a number of plays put on at the Gualala Arts Center. He has given sermons at his local church when his pastor has been on vacation. He has a weekly radio show. Not bad for someone who describes himself as painfully shy at age four.

Sadly, Linda died in an automobile accident early last year. Joel and Jeremy work hard to keep the Four-Eyed Frog alive and well. Stop by when you visit the California north coast. You can buy our books as well as many others at this unique book store.

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