Anoula

 

   Ήθελα να’ χα δυο καρδιές και πάλι να’ χα κι’ άλλη
                             να σ’ αγαπώ και με τις τρεις και λίγο να‘ ναι πάλι

 

This month, my wife Anna – everyone, including her mother, calls her Anoula – and I will be celebrating 24 years of marriage. It’s hard to believe our years together have flown by so fast.Our youngest son, Chris, enters college in the fall, leaving us with an empty nest. Seems like only yesterday we were taking our first tenuous steps as a married couple. 

Anna grew up in the working class Athens neighborhood of Kesariani during the junta years when the military ran Greece (1967-1974).  Her father and mother struggled to run a small upholstery shop catering to the needs and whims of wealthier Greeks who wanted to decorate their massive living rooms.  The tattered apartment block where Anna lived reflected the tragedies its inhabitants had endured.  It always represented something special to me. Inside were people who not only endured destiny’s barbed arrows but also cherished the simple pleasures that life offered them. Doors were always open and people moved back and forth from one apartment to another. They shared their food, laughter, hopes and joys. Sometimes they shared their sorrows and tears. No matter how scarred on the outside, on the inside the heartbeat was strong and vital. 

One of Anna’s friends who lived in the same apartment block was married to a young Greek army officer who had befriended me.  Eventually, I was invited to their home and immediately adopted into the wider neighborhood family despite my strange background. The first time I laid eyes on the beautiful, shy woman with the soft voice who would eventually become my wife I never thought I could make much of an impression on her, let alone get her to go out with me. I think she felt sorry for the funny looking Amerikanaki, far from home, speaking in that quaint American-accented Greek, staring at her with forlorn puppy dog eyes.  Luckily for me, Anna felt compassion for strays and decided I was in need of her beneficent kindness. 

I returned to Kesariani many times and spent many a summer evening on her balcony overlooking the courtyard behind the apartment block. It was an urban oasis of sorts far from the din of traffic.  Anna’s mother would keep busy in the kitchen, the smell of garlic, onions and fried fish wafting through the air, while her father would smoke his stub of a cigarette, seated on a wooden chair, one leg folded over the other, as he philosophized about life in general and his in particular.  We drank coffee as I sat there oblivious to everything except Anoula, who would sneak a peak at me and smile while she set the table and I would smile back at her. 

Somehow I managed to find my way into her heart.  It was the result of a dogged persistence on my part and I am sure, my mother’s frequent prayers to the Theotokos, beseeching her to help me find a “nice Greek girl” to marry. When I think back to those early days I marvel that Anna was willing to give up so much for a guy like me. I was asking a great deal of her, not only to leave behind the only life she had ever known but also to travel thousands of miles away to a strange place as the wife of a Marine whose life resembled that of an itinerant gypsy. 

On our wedding day, I talked a friend of mine, a US Army master sergeant named Frank, who owned the only white Lincoln Continental Town car in Greece, to pick up my father-in-law and Anna in her wedding dress and drive them to the little whitewashed church in Voula where we were to be married. Needless to say that Lincoln was the talk of Kesariani and it was rumored that the American ambassador himself was driving it.  I remember standing transfixed as Anoula, resplendent in her wedding gown, walked down the church aisle holding her father’s arm. After living in Greece as a married couple for six months, I got orders transferring me to Quantico, Va.  Our lives would never be the same.  

Anna’s first days in America were not auspicious. She spent them in an old converted barracks on base while we waited for housing.  She immediately set to work trying to make that ramshackle room a home.  Her efforts was interspersed with occasional screams when she would open a drawer and send hundreds of cockroaches running for cover. Why she didn’t panic, pack her bags and catch the first flight back to Athens, I’ll never know. 

Anna spoke the Queens’s English when she arrived in America.  Unfortunately the refined English pronunciation and grammar she learned in Greece, taught by instructors who had studied in the British Isles, didn’t come in very handy when negotiating what passes for English among Southerners.  A phrase like “Y’all come back now, heah?” would elicit a puzzled look from Anna that would send me into convulsions of laughter. Thank God for the daily soap opera “Days of Our Lives” and reruns of the TV series “I Love Lucy” and “Mayberry, RFD,” because they taught Anoula how to communicate in America.

Just when we thought we had achieved a delicate balance in our relationship, the kids arrived.  All that nice couple stuff was put aside in order to tackle the really difficult work of raising a family. I don’t really think I  appreciated how lucky I was to have Anna as a wife until I saw her giving birth to my sons. Watching her stoically endure the ordeal of a 20-hour labor, while quietly clutching my hand as she listened to the bloodcurdling cacophony of another woman in labor, was a revelation to me. Anna had a serene strength that I never realized, and I marveled at her tenacity and courage. Watching her holding my newborn son and smiling at him is a memory I will cherish all my life.

As Anna began adjusting to her new life, God once again, decided to test her mettle. During the first Gulf War I was shipped out to Saudi Arabia with my unit from Camp Lejeune, leaving Anna and 3-year-old Nick behind in a town that had been stripped of most of its male population. Waiting in the desert as part of the greatest invasion force assembled since World War II, I could only imagine what Anna was going through back home.  The highlight of my tedious days in the desert was waiting for mail call and the possibility of a letter and pictures from Anna. Inside my helmet throughout the entire campaign was a picture of her. It kept me going. When things looked bleak, I’d take my steel pot off and stare at her photo to remind myself of home and how much she meant to me. One of the greatest moments of my life was taking her into my arms again after returning from the war.

Anna is the consummate Mama. I can see her now chasing little Niko around with a spoonful of food, or sitting at Chris’s bedside in the hospital when we thought he had leukemia; beaming  proudly at them both at a piano recital or at a soccer game or as they danced the kalamatiano at a church dance. Anna is the kind of Mom whose radar is always up, springing into action at the first sign that all was not right with her babies.  Whether it was making their cot and fluffing pillows before she left them at Boy Scout camp or holding their heads while they were throwing up, Anna has always been there. 

I’m no Dr. Phil, but I’ve learned that married life is a long term effort to figure out your spouse. Just when we think we know our partner, they mature, evolve and change. That requires us to adjust accordingly, even putting our priorities aside for the sake of our spouse or the kids.  It’s all about compromise isn’t it?  After the initial chemical attraction begins to wear off, that’s when the hard work begins. That’s when we have to learn not only how to live together but how to survive when life throws us a curve ball. 

I believe real love happens when a couple meets the challenges life offers together. Some relationships are fragile and they break apart when things go wrong; others, including luckily my own, have a tendency to become stronger.  It is easy to whisper sweet nothings into each other’s ears, to send flowers, cards or gifts professing one’s love. What is more meaningful, more difficult  and ultimately longer lasting is mutual commitment to support each other through life’s ups and downs, being considerate and above all, respectful of each other’s feelings.

Anoula, agapi mou, happy anniversary and thanks for all our years together. I’m looking forward to many more, God willing, at your side.   

Apopse Tha Perasw - Rebetiko Original

 

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Comments

[Susan]

Just wait until you become Pappous and Yiayia!!That takes your relationship to a whole new level.

[Stavros]

Hi Susan,

I'm looking forward to it :)

[Istvan]

Dear Stavros

This is what one could wish for him/herself.
About change and evolving; I wish you more grandchildren than you could easily keep track of :-)
Eftihismeni epeteios!

[Stavros]

Hi Istvan,

Hope you are well. From your lips to God's ear.

All the best, Stavros

[kat]

Dare I say that Anna is more beautiful today than she was back then, and I have great admiration for the relationship, marriage and family you built through love and, most of all, truly hard work. As you said, not everyone survives life's trials. I wish you, Annoula, Nick and Chris many happy years ahead.

[Stavros]

Thanks Kat, best wishes to you and Chris.