The gift of laughing with your spouse

In 47 years of marriage, he has learned that God’s grace has many forms, including that gift “… And it’s the way that she looks with the rice in her hair”

By George Valadie

“Eating burnt suppers the whole first year
“And asking for seconds to keep her from tearing up
“Yeah, man, that’s the good stuff.”
—Kenny Chesney, “The Good Stuff”

It was summer 1977. And we weren’t all that far into the newlywed phase of our young lives.

Still, it wasn’t like we were just getting used to one another either. Hardly. Our first date had been four and a half years before. Neither of us dated anyone else again.

She says she knew I was the one long before I knew the same about her. She’s not wrong. We had talked about getting married, and I couldn’t see myself with anyone else, but I’d definitely been hesitant to ask.

When I finally did, her final year of college remained while I was in my second year of teaching in Catholic schools. Annual salary: $8,000. Eight!

We didn’t have much.

These lyrics sang out to me just the other day when she said, “Hey George, can you help me mash up the rest of these potatoes? I can’t seem to get enough leverage. I’m trying a new recipe I found on the internet, and I want to take these tomorrow when we go to dinner.”

In that moment, I couldn’t recall her ever having come up short on mashed-potato leverage before, but I could definitely remember her trying new recipes now and again.

Like when we were those newlyweds. Our first little house. Dinner for two. End of a long day. But what she was serving looked a little … well, let’s say, different.

And when she’s nervous about something, she laughs. A silly little giggle. Hand over her mouth. A mix of glimmer, deviousness with a hint of embarrassment in her eye. She can say a mouthful—without a single word. It gets me every time.

I was staring at the meal on my plate when she sheepishly offered, “I wanted to try something new, and I found a recipe that sounded good. It’s called Italian Fish.”

Sounded good to me. I love fish. I love Italian. It was good I loved her. Because the rest of that story is hers.

“We had some fish in the freezer we needed to use, and I wanted to dress it up. I saw this recipe in that cookbook we got for a wedding present, and it sounded amazing.

“Except when I started making it, I realized we didn’t have everything it called for. It said we needed marinara sauce, but we didn’t have any.”

Let me interject here to say it wasn’t that we had run out, to the contrary and to my knowledge; not at any time during our three short months of married life had we actually ever bought or borrowed any marinara sauce. Not a single jar.

“But I did find a can of chili. And it seemed like it might be a good substitute. My mother has always been good at making incredible meals from whatever she had.”

Marinara? Chili? Italian? Mexican? Go on.

“So, you bake the fish then cover it with marinara, top that with some shredded mozzarella, and run it all under the broiler. Doesn’t it sound good?”

“That does,” I said. “Not to be critical, but this looks yellow. I thought mozzarella was white?”

“It is. We didn’t have any of that either. But we did have some Kraft American slices. So, I put those on top instead.”

A giggle in her laugh. A glimmer in her eye.

“What do you think?”

It was every bit as bad as it sounds. And yes, I asked for seconds. Not the whole first year, but a few times. We have forever called it “chili fish” and treasure the laughter it still evokes.

In a week, we will celebrate our 47th wedding anniversary. More than once a few folks have said, “I bet y’all laugh all the time!”

She wasn’t laughing that time I sent her roses. It was an emergency apology of sorts. I had a side gig at the time, trying to earn us a little extra money, but it involved traveling out of town several weekends a year, leaving her with our two toddlers.

I woke up one of those Friday mornings to discover the water heater had spewed its guts all over the basement. “Honey, wake up, I’ve got to go, but I need to tell you something … I’ll see you Sunday morning.”

She can laugh now. But she’s still mad about it.

Back to her mashed potatoes. I walked over to the counter to lend some masculine leverage, only to discover a battlefield where war had been waged—and lost. Bits of potato dotted the backsplash, the salt and pepper shakers, the decorative candle, the steak knives holder and every knife stored down in it, the cutting board, the stove, the floor. There was one big glop of potato on the overhead microwave.

“The new recipe said to bake the potatoes for 40 minutes rather than boil them,” she said. And even I know it takes an hour to make them edible.

“I’ve never seen anything like this,” I uttered.

Turns out using an electric mixer to take on semi-uncooked potatoes is a losing proposition. Still, I mashed and cussed and cussed and mashed. And then—20 minutes in—she asked, “Did I forget to tell you to put some milk in? That might help.”

Then she giggled that giggle that says it all.

Forty-seven years! Laugh all the time? No. But God has blessed us with that gift for sure.

How does any couple make it without it?

Our Catechism speaks beautifully about marriage. There are words like covenant, mystery, indissolubility, sacrament, love, and grace.

I’m no theologian, but I believe God’s grace has many forms—and one is the gift of laughing with your spouse. A lot.

That’s the good stuff!

Dear God—Not everyone gets the years they dream of … or the person. Please bless us with “love”—all sorts of it—our world needs a whole lot more than we have. Amen.

 

George Valadie is a parishioner at St. Stephen Church in Chattanooga and author of the newly released book “We Lost Our Fifth Fork … and other moments when we need some perspective.”