till death do us part

Today would've been my parents' 30th wedding anniversary.
And I would like to honor that by writing about them in today's post. It makes sense: I write about relationships, and to me, they had the best kind of romantic relationship you could wish to have. It's true, I will never know if they would have stayed together had my mother not passed away, but it doesn't matter because it didn't happen.
So here's their story.

30 years ago like today, my parents stood in front of a mayor in Cyprus, and exchanged vows. They had a civil wedding because she was Sunni and he was Catholic, and Lebanon didn't allow that in 1984. It still doesn't.

It took a while before they got to exchange those vows. The first time my father saw my mother, he was 17, she was 18. He spotted her in front of a school, looked at her and thought: "this woman will be my wife." That's what he says anyway --but it's so cosmically romantic that I want to believe him. They only met several years later, through a friend in common, and started dating. They dated for 7 years before they got married. It was during the Lebanese civil war, Christians and Muslims were killing each other, and they were in love. You can imagine how my grandparents felt about their relationship. And so they left each other a few times, trying to comply with society's wishes... but they always got back. I once found a letter from my father to my mother, written during one of those times. He wrote "If you're not in my life, my life will never be complete. You are the one. There is nothing else I want."
It may seem futile --anyone can write these words. But do they? 

But the truth is, although beginnings are very important, the real test of love, I think, is what happens with time. A lot of couples start out madly in love, can't-live-without-each-other passion and whatnot. But they don't all stand the test of time. To me, the greatest proof of love are my parents. Not everyone can say that --in fact, many people around me would say the exact opposite. Our generation's phobia of commitment obviously comes from their parents' examples. And my hope for love obviously comes from mine.

13 years ago like today, my parents celebrated their last anniversary together. My mom had a brain tumor, lung cancer, and liver cancer; she had three months left to live; but she wanted to celebrate. She knew it would be the last time. She made me her accomplice. She rented a hotel room which we decorated with rose petals and balloons. She took my father for dinner at the hotel, and had the waiter bring the room key in stead of the check. My father blushed as if he was 18 years old. And it was just like when they were.

You know it's love when a man still wears his wedding ring 13 years after his wife died --and wears hers on a chain around his neck. You know it's love when even "till death do us part," doesn't.

{first published on the 21st of February 2010 on Beirut Rhapsodies)