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What's Love Got To Do With It?
The five-column headline read: "Love Helps Alzheimer's Victims Survive, Study Says." The reporter wrote: "What's love got to do with it? Just about everything, says a researcher who studied what happens in a marriage when a spouse gets Alzheimer's disease." In Prof. Lore Wright's study of 47 couples over a two-year period, she had predicted with 100 percent accuracy who would die first, based on her analysis of the love relationship between husband and wife.

I attended a workshop in which another expert told us that there were two reasons people keep a family member at home rather than in a nursing facility: economic necessity or feelings of guilt. Afterwards I spoke with her privately, trying to elicit some other possible motive for keeping someone at home. But she insisted those were the only two motives. Finally I asked, "What about love?" "Oh," she replied, "we put that under guilt." So much for love.

What some people find so hard to understand is that loving Muriel isn't hard. They wonder about my former loves—like my work. A college freshman heard that I had resigned as president of Columbia International University to care for my wife. "Do you miss being president?" Scott asked as we sat in our little garden. I told him I'd never thought about it, but, on reflection, no. As exhilarating as my work had been, I enjoyed learning to cook and keep house. No, I'd never looked back.

But that night I did reflect on his question and turned to the Lord. "Father, I like this assignment, and I have no regrets. But if a coach puts a man on the bench, he must not want him in the game. You needn't tell me, of course, but I'd like to know—why didn't you need me in the game?"

I didn't sleep well that night and awoke contemplating the puzzle. Muriel was still mobile at that time, so we set out on our morning walk around the block. She wasn't too sure on her feet, so we went slowly and held hands as we always do. This day I heard footsteps behind me and looked back to see the familiar form of a local derelict behind us. He staggered past us, then turned and looked us up and down. "Tha's good. I likes 'at," he said. "Tha's real good. I likes it." He turned and headed back down the street, mumbling to himself over and over, "Tha's good. I likes it."

When Muriel and I reached our little garden and sat down, his words came back to me. Then the realization hit me; the Lord had spoken through an inebriated old derelict. "It is you who are whispering to my spirit, 'I likes it, tha's good,' " I said aloud. "I may be on the bench, but if you like it and say it's good, that's all that counts."

Some of my best friends don't agree. One wrote last week, "Muriel doesn't know you anymore, doesn't know anything, really, so it's time to put her in a nursing home and get on with life." That day may come—when, because of a change in my health or hers, she could be better cared for by others—but for now, she needs me, and I need her.

The Good Life
"How do you do it? What are your resources?" asked the host on the television show Day of Discovery. I hadn't thought about it, but since then I have. Praise helps. Right now, I think my life must be happier than the lives of 95 percent of the people on planet Earth. Muriel's a joy to me, and life is good to both of us, in different ways. But I'm thinking of something more basic than just "counting your blessings."

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February (Web-only) 2004, Vol. 48