A Valentine's Day Love Story: How I Met My Husband

I had a habit of instantly devaluing the disabled, the underprivileged, or the undereducated. I was intent on rehabilitating that behavior. At my first encounter with Bruce, I had been abandoned by the entire pharmacy staff and was left to deal with him alone. He was an outwardly angry man and a difficult customer.

He was a stroke victim and the physical effects were obvious. He struggled to make his left hand execute his signature for medications. When I offered to waive the requirement, he would not hear of it. I had many long moments to observe and reflect as he struggled. My compassion was touched, and I began to develop an admiration for the disabled as I watched him doggedly, and forthrightly, accomplish this task.

I worked in that pharmacy for one year, and I saw Bruce, perhaps, a dozen times as a customer. Occasionally, we would see each other on the bus and would acknowledge each other on the days Bruce remembered he knew me. I continued to respect his efforts to overcome the obstacles of living with the limitations of his handicaps but in all honestly, I would generally avoid interaction, as he frequently appeared to be angry and surly.

Over the next three years, I began to notice a softening and a kindness develop in him. I didn't try so hard to avoid him. He began to encourage me when he would see me in a depressed state of mind.

In the summer of 2004, I encountered Bruce at a bus stop and we talked as we waited for a very late bus. He shared that he was doing all right but was beginning to consider finding himself a wife to help him. Bruce had relinquished his financial affairs to SSA appointed administrators and they did not allow him many choices.

He said, "Dad said I should go back to the synagogue and meet people so I am. I'm trying to find a good Jewish wife who can help me with these things."

I chuckled and responded, "Seems we're in about the same boat. I'm looking for a good Mormon husband to help me with things!"

Shortly after that meeting - it seemed that Bruce was more frequently on my morning bus. When I was getting on the bus to head for work, he was getting off that same bus to go to his job.

One morning, as Bruce got off the bus, he handed me a yellow piece of paper on which he'd written his name and number. He beamed and said "That's my number" and he asked if I'd call him.

I couldn't. I knew of nothing I could say that would help him remember who I was. He never had learned my name. I'd never told him, he couldn't read my name badge and now years had passed. He was accustomed to living in a world of nameless friends and strangers.

I had learned that he could read numbers enough to place phone calls, find the right bus and even find addresses. So, I decided to slip him a note when we crossed paths at the bus stop again. I was in the process of addressing little children's Valentine Cards to share with my office-mates. I took one of those juvenile cards and wrote a little note with my number on the back.

The next day, as he stepped from the bus, I gave him the Valentine's card.

His eyebrows raised, eyes wide open, his head dropped and he stared at it in his hand. He then looked at me completely bewildered.

"I can't read", he said, seeming humiliated because he didn't know if that would be all right with me. I watched fear, hope, despair and anticipation cross his face in milliseconds.

"I know", I responded. "But you CAN read numbers. That's mine. Call me!"

Two days later, on Saturday, February 12th, 2005 he did.

We talked for hours, sharing about ourselves. He talked of his commitment to Alcoholics Anonymous, the twelve step program, and The Big Book. He explained what he had done for the 'steps' that required repentance and restitution. He spoke of his commitment to progress, to service and of his devotion to God, and to prayer. He had spent seven years focusing his energies on self improvement, much of it in response to his personal conversations with God.

He became curious about my commitment to the gospel, to repentance, to progress, and to my hopes for eternal exaltation. I was engrossed in a personal improvement program and it monopolized the description of myself. What I was saying was so familiar to him. He could remember learning similar things in AA. His curiosity grew to the extent that he accepted my invitation to meet the Mormon missionaries.

At the first meeting with the missionaries - they asked a question that would help them to understand where this Jewish stroke victim was in his relationship to God.

One of the men said, "So, Bruce. Tell us what you know about God. Who is He?"

And Bruce, the devout Jew, responded, "Oh - that's easy. He's the guy with the holes in his hands."

It was obvious by the way that he spoke that he had actually "met" God or conversed with Him. He had seen the Holes in His hands. He tells the beginning of that story like this:

When I had my stroke, I had to start going to places for school. And as I was walking to go to school I had to turn around because I thought somebody was talking to me and there was nobody there.

And I turned around and I started walking back to Easter Seals in the area where I was at and again ... it happened again. And I had to turn around and I tried to find out who it was that was talking to me. And I didn't know who it was.

And then as I was walking further to Easter Seals, all of a sudden God smacked me in my head and said "This is God, Bruce. Pay Attention" and He helped me to understand.

Bruce shared that he learned to pray at AA. He did as he was asked and prayed frequently. He discovered that he could hear answers to his every question whenever he "shut up and listened". When Bruce speaks, people usually have a difficult time understanding him. He has aphasia. But he was always understood when he prayed. He learned to trust the answers. He knew that he was talking to God and he knew that God was answering. He knew what God wanted him to do and he was doing the best he could.

Everything developed quickly from there. Within six weeks of giving me that little yellow piece of paper - with his name and number - he was baptized on March 26, 2005. On March 27th, Easter Sunday, he was confirmed and ordained to the Aaronic Priesthood in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. More importantly, that same day, Bruce proposed marriage. On April 15th, 2005 we were married.

I wish I had the words that would convey the tender mercies of his spiritual conversion and the honor it was to be witness to it. I was overjoyed to witness repeated demonstration of the simple and pure faith of this man who personally communed with God. I had never met a greater man than this - this man of God, this man of prayer, this man of faith, this man of utter humility. Through Bruce, I witnessed that God can truly save each of us along our individual "road to Emmaeus."

Originally, I was content to rejoice in the marvelous work, in the sublime wisdom, that proceeded forth from this man very nearly stripped of language. Falling in love and getting married was the last thing I ever intended to happen between us.