Robert Adams and his Ruth
I met Robert Adams on a September morning in the attic of the old Moore Memorial Library with the red clay roof and the 4 pillar stone front. The town historians, who, in a previous life, had been my beloved field hockey coach and Spanish teacher, introduced me to him.
Robert Adams was packed in a bundle of letters, tied with a white cotton ribbon and was handed to me carefully in a stack that only hinted of the person I would find within. I knew he didn’t make it through the war, before I even started. Have I become a person who prefers tragedy? Obsessed with the people who are forced to survive?
“He died in the Fall of ’44,” they said.
“I am sad about this.” I admitted over dinner with my parents.
“But, it is the end of everyone’s story, Rebecca.” My Dad said, reminding me that World War II men are dying too steadily now to deny that war is the only executioner in which to worry.
I nodded.
“But, I am still sad.” I repeated, even if, I suppose, the end of every good life does that to us.
It was months later, after all the letters had been read and we were back in the attic and now looking for costume ideas for the Hometown Holiday skits, when I asked Mrs. Bromley, “Do you know exactly how Robert Adams died? And did, Ruth, his Ruth, ever get remarried?”
She found easily the folder in which she couldn’t find that September morning before and there in a photograph was Robert standing next to Ruth, on their wedding day. Ruth, “the girl from a certain valley”.
They look young and very serious.
Do I love him simply for the way he loved her? The way he longed to just marry, despite the obstacles? or is it, the way he spoke of the coming war?
“There seems to be a promise of an exciting future-if you care for such a promise.”
It would be easy to like him, I suppose. With the newspaper clipping telling of Corporal Adams writing the mayor of Sidney with a “national defense problem” and sending cash for a dozen roses to be delivered to his “favorite girl” on St. Valentines’ Day.
I am serious when I say my affection for him does not lie in the roses. I know myself enough to know it's in the words, the letters (written to his aunt, uncle, cousin)
I traced the picture with my finger until Mrs. Bromley asked if I wanted a copy.
“Yes, please.” I said swallowing the lump that had started to form in my throat.
“People don’t write that way anymore.” My sister later said, when I stopped by with the photocopies clutched in my hand, “I mean with emails and text messaging, it just isn’t the same.” She continued.
I nodded in agreement, but I was lying because all I could picture was the stack of printed emails from a present day soldier addressed to me. They sit on my dresser waiting to be read during the nights when I can't seem to let him go. I still find comfort and despair in the thought of us.
I know I was once loved. My family thinks it is unhealthy. They are right, for I am not a widow and 6 years could be considered long enough. But, I have started to believe forever could pass this way.
“October 11th.” Mrs. Bromley answered, “He fell in battle along the Siegfried Line in Germany. He is buried in the U.S. cemetery in Henri-Chappelle, Belgium.”
"...and it looks like Ruth remarried a man named Jack Bowman. They eventually had a son."
Remarried.
The wedding announcement in the paper said she chose a gown of pink nylon with a wreath of flowers holding her fingertip veil.
A pink gown.
A wreath of flowers.
A grave in Belgium.
Robert Adams was packed in a bundle of letters, tied with a white cotton ribbon and was handed to me carefully in a stack that only hinted of the person I would find within. I knew he didn’t make it through the war, before I even started. Have I become a person who prefers tragedy? Obsessed with the people who are forced to survive?
“He died in the Fall of ’44,” they said.
“I am sad about this.” I admitted over dinner with my parents.
“But, it is the end of everyone’s story, Rebecca.” My Dad said, reminding me that World War II men are dying too steadily now to deny that war is the only executioner in which to worry.
I nodded.
“But, I am still sad.” I repeated, even if, I suppose, the end of every good life does that to us.
It was months later, after all the letters had been read and we were back in the attic and now looking for costume ideas for the Hometown Holiday skits, when I asked Mrs. Bromley, “Do you know exactly how Robert Adams died? And did, Ruth, his Ruth, ever get remarried?”
She found easily the folder in which she couldn’t find that September morning before and there in a photograph was Robert standing next to Ruth, on their wedding day. Ruth, “the girl from a certain valley”.
They look young and very serious.
Do I love him simply for the way he loved her? The way he longed to just marry, despite the obstacles? or is it, the way he spoke of the coming war?
“There seems to be a promise of an exciting future-if you care for such a promise.”
It would be easy to like him, I suppose. With the newspaper clipping telling of Corporal Adams writing the mayor of Sidney with a “national defense problem” and sending cash for a dozen roses to be delivered to his “favorite girl” on St. Valentines’ Day.
I am serious when I say my affection for him does not lie in the roses. I know myself enough to know it's in the words, the letters (written to his aunt, uncle, cousin)
I traced the picture with my finger until Mrs. Bromley asked if I wanted a copy.
“Yes, please.” I said swallowing the lump that had started to form in my throat.
“People don’t write that way anymore.” My sister later said, when I stopped by with the photocopies clutched in my hand, “I mean with emails and text messaging, it just isn’t the same.” She continued.
I nodded in agreement, but I was lying because all I could picture was the stack of printed emails from a present day soldier addressed to me. They sit on my dresser waiting to be read during the nights when I can't seem to let him go. I still find comfort and despair in the thought of us.
I know I was once loved. My family thinks it is unhealthy. They are right, for I am not a widow and 6 years could be considered long enough. But, I have started to believe forever could pass this way.
“October 11th.” Mrs. Bromley answered, “He fell in battle along the Siegfried Line in Germany. He is buried in the U.S. cemetery in Henri-Chappelle, Belgium.”
"...and it looks like Ruth remarried a man named Jack Bowman. They eventually had a son."
Remarried.
The wedding announcement in the paper said she chose a gown of pink nylon with a wreath of flowers holding her fingertip veil.
A pink gown.
A wreath of flowers.
A grave in Belgium.
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