Fifty-Three Years

Words and photography by Anna Rosova

In December, while sitting at the dining table of the family holiday home celebrating an early Christmas, my 93-year-old grandfather announced that he was in love with my grandmother.

A seemingly innocent statement, but a bold one from a man who rarely vocalised his emotions, who spent a lifetime working in neuroscience and will rationalise and lecture about everything and anything — even spirituality. A strange, vibrating silence followed.

In April this year, it will be 54 years since they married. It’s a marriage that has met many challenges: post-war trauma, illness, the loss of a child.

When I asked my grandmother why she didn’t seem as surprised as I was, she said he had said it a lot recently – giving her compliments, being warmer, more appreciative. Of course, now that they are older and frailer, they (literally) lean on each other for everything. 

There is the ideal of what we think love should look like, an ideal that so many of us search for. But what does it look like when that ideal is achieved? What is a lifetime together, and is it an actual happily ever after? 

I spoke to both my Grandfather and Grandmother to find out. 

Juris: It’s essential to have a certain level of patience with the other’s faults and shortcomings. If they are growling, complaining, and moaning, and you think the growls are completely out of order? You have to stay calm. It’s very important.

In other words, you see both the good and the bad sides, but the negative should be put to one side. So it’s achievable, but you have to want to.

Māra: I remember when we were first dating and travelling in the mountains, he used to have this backpack, and on top of it, he had attached his underwear for everyone to see. Back then, I just thought it was a bizarre thing to do.

When you live together for many years, these things become more than just “a little strange”. Sometimes I want to protest loudly, but it’s good if you manage to tape your mouth shut and keep it to yourself. Overall, it’s good to accept the other person as they are and not keep illusions that you will change them. It just won’t happen. Even if you sometimes want to.

It’s interesting — we’ve never lived as closely as we are living now. And then a lot of things come out; it’s either things that you like or things that you don’t, but acceptance is very important. We all think we are perfect — in reality, none of us are.

Māra: We met on the 1st May 1967. I’d gone to the hospital on a Saturday, I was there purely to work and just wanted to check on some patients. In the hallway I ran into Juris. He asked me if I wanted to come for a boat ride with him and another colleague. And I thought - why not go, what’s the worst that could happen?

It was a hot and sunny day, so me and my colleague decided we wanted to go swimming. As neither of us had brought a bathing suit, we had to go swimming in the nude. The water was freezing.

Juris: Both ladies are yelling - I was thinking, what is happening there? Are there crocodiles attacking? I looked in their direction; how can you not look? Maybe something had happened? And then I see they’re just jumping around in the water and squealing.

Māra: Even now, I like to remind the professor that he was illegally peeking at the ladies swimming!

Māra: When my son was born, I went on maternity leave and later left my job. Then my daughter arrived, and I didn’t work in between. When they were older, I started taking on shift work.

His work was objectively challenging, and he was writing books in his spare time. Back then, it was a time when all of this was normal, and that’s just the way things were done. The man existed in one sphere, and the children were mainly with the woman. It wasn’t a dynamic that was ever really discussed. It was just how it fell naturally.

Nowadays, I see how dads take part in their children's upbringing and feel very joyous — but also a little jealous.

Māra: I remember we were once discussing something and couldn’t agree – and then I said, “Well, maybe we should get a divorce?” And he said, “Well, we could do that, but you won’t be able to run away from yourself, one way or another.”

Juris: It’s incredibly simple – divorce happens when everything is a constant argument. When both parties stick to their version, they spend one or two years constantly in deadlock and just growling at each other. Those annoyances must be paused; one has to put brakes on; otherwise, it’s easy for it all to come out.

Māra: There are times when a divorce is realistically necessary, and we all have encountered such instances, but when it comes to us, I think…

Juris: Well, who knows, maybe in the 55th year…

Māra: Stop talking nonsense. It’s very important to laugh. You can’t be without humour. Otherwise, you would just die. I think I understand his humour. Do you understand my jokes?

Juris: Yes, I do understand.

Juris: A wise man once said – when love knocks on the door, there must be a foundation in place for the door and for the walls to hold. If you have all of that, then love can enter, and it will always be relatively enduring and long-lasting. However, if it only stands on one leg and without solid ground, it won’t stick around for long.

I’ve been speaking about tolerance - I’m reading a lot of Ramana Maharishi at the moment, and he said it well: “You are all wonders, miracles that are wandering the earth, admirable beings, but the misfortune is that you don't know it yourselves.”

The most important thing we have is awareness, which creates our world. Together with consciousness and the opportunities, we are given while living here, on this small globe, spinning around with incredible speed, we are in a unique place with unique beings. Love, it will enter if the door is open.

Māra: I think the person who has met love is a happy one. We don’t always appreciate it when we have it, that we have the opportunity to give and receive it. Sometimes we forget how lucky we are.

I was on the phone today, and we were discussing someone we know that is the same age as my husband, but she has severe dementia and lives completely in her own world. I was reminded how lucky I am to live next to a person with who I can discuss everything. 

Read the other stories in our LOVE edition.