Beautiful. This restored my faith in Salon.

Just beautiful...keep it coming, Salon!

Why I loved it: I love reading about people and how they get through life. Mr. Pesce is frank about his own shortcomings and did not try to make his marriage sound like a fairy tale. Stories like this help us learn and maybe if we are lucky, do better in our own lives.

that was really nice. I was left taking care of my father whom after 5 years passed, he had Alzheimer's, so I know that part of the story.

It sounds like a vary good love you have with your wife

Excellent.

The love Paul has for his wife is so deep and profound, he will most likely outlast her.

My grandfather broke his hip at the age of 89 and was walking without the help of a cane within the year. It was sheer force of will. My grandmother was suffering from dementia and he was going to make sure she was properly cared for. She died within hours of her 87th birthday and he followed her three years later at the age of 96.

What a voice - kudos to Salon for publishing this. Too often in today's media older people are portrayed as either maudlin or wacky. I hope this story finds it's way to a lot of younger readers. It's beautiful.

Wow. This inspires me.It seems to me one of the keys to the longevity as a couple is that they appreciated each other's gifts. Thanks Salon. I hope this story is true. If it's not I don't want to know. I also hope, that if there is a heaven the way it is often conceived then may Mr. Pesce spend eternity with his beloved.

She handled millions of dollars for him - take her to the goddamned movie theater instead of trying to find a free classroom that shows movies. Jesus.

And he cheated on her. He had girlfriends during their marriage.

I needed to read that. Thank you.

Is there a name for this particular writing style? I thought at first that Cary Tennis must have written the article, since it sounds so much like his column.

Anyway... I was really struck by two points in the article that have left me wondering sadly what *her* tale would be like. How did she feel about marriage in a society where she was (according to him) expected to "accept it gracefully" if he was cheating on her? What did she enjoy doing, what did she do when not calming his temper, running his businesses, using all of her abilities to make his wishes come true, or raising kids? (Did she figure she'd finally get to focus on herself as a senior, only to have the Alzheimer's tragically take over?)

It sounds like it was blissful for Mr. Pesce; it's sad that there's no way for us to tell how happy Mrs. Pesce is from the text. His description showed me one reason women began fighting for the ability to choose whether they wanted that kind of life without society judging them for wanting something else.

For her ability to make money for him and turning a blind eye to all the other women he slept with during their marriage?

Her heart was certainly stabbed many times by this man.

Ta, he's had it good, the bastard.

Thanks Salon for this excellent story.

Am I the only person that was disturbed by the casual mention of both the assumed cheating *and* then smacking his wife upon coming back? While she did hit him first, women were a lot softer/weaker back then & men were considerably stronger, and she struck in a location that suggests she was also quite a bit tinier.

If I vanished for two days (let alone with a rival), I'd have come back feeling overwhelmingly remorseful. So if the person I was dating was tinier/weaker and hit me, I wouldn't feel right striking back; I'd feel like I'd earned that reaction, or at least like hitting them would be insult on top of injury. My regret would certainly be clear if I spoke of it decades later; I can't imagine speaking against the person's right to leave me.

I can't wait for the next one.

Fifty years ago, the subway fare was 15¢, not a quarter. Tsk, tsk...

Is this fact or fiction? Is this an interview that the writer subsequently edited into the form we just read? Or is Paul & Eleanor's story just a lovely construction of wishful nostalgia, what a long marriage might look like if invented by someone else... Which one?

It's a beautiful story. Some of the best stories I've seen were fiction, and some were true; still I remember them.

It's interesting when some people see, in Paul's gratitude for Eleanor, only 'how much he used her'. I insist on seeing the gratitude, the forgiveness he so much admired. He mentioned the moments she calmed him down, but certainly didn't mention the moments he calmed her down. He mentioned what she did for him, but not what he did for her. People understand that as 'using' or 'taking advantage'. I find this normal in a piece that is so centered on gratitude.

I would very much like to see Eleanor's side of the story--it might show that Paul actually played down his side of the relationship quite a lot--just as you'd expect in a piece based on gratitude.

Remember the Chinese warriors...

My mother is about the same age as "Eleanor," and she is also experiencing early stages of Alzheimers. Her husband, my father, died 30 years ago, almost to the day. I sometimes try to reconstruct their early life together with what I've heard, and what I've inferred.

What's hard for me to get my arms around -- in terms of both my mother's life, and the life of "Eleanor" -- is the sweetness of fate that brought them together with their future husbands, and the reality of their husband's attitude towards them as people.

Real or fictional, this guy sounds like a real prick. So was my father.

All my mother has left to show for her life are grossly distorted memories of the past, and a short term memory of maybe 5 mintues. What a shame she wasn't treated better. The outcome of her life would have been the same, I guess, but the journey would have been so much more fulfilling.