“Love is lovelier the second time around, just as wonderful with both feet on the ground. It’s that second time you hear your love song sung, makes you think perhaps that love, like youth, is wasted on the young.”
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If Sammy Cahn was right about this when he wrote these lyrics in 1960, I wouldn’t know. Grumpy and I are about to celebrate our 39th wedding anniversary, but with Valentine’s Day just around the corner, I asked two second-time-around couples to share their thoughts. Turns out, it might just be worth giving it a try…
Linda Linford had a very successful first marriage, which ended tragically when her husband Tom died right before their 30th wedding anniversary.
“He was Mr. Romance, he was incredible,” said Linford, former executive director of Naperville Area Humane Society. “Valentine’s Day was a special day to us because we held our rehearsal dinner then, just before getting married on Feb. 20. When he retired, and I was working, he would take me out for breakfast, lunch and dinner to celebrate. I had more flowers and jewelry than any woman could deserve.”
The couple’s song was Randy Travis’ “Forever and Ever, Amen.”
“We always signed cards to each other like that,” she said. “For me, personally, when we met, it was love at first sight. I fell for his warmth, sense of humor and pretty brown eyes.”
In 2007, her husband was diagnosed with throat cancer. After his carotid artery ruptured, he received life-saving surgery.
“Tom lost all feeling in his throat after that and his speaking voice,” Linford said. “For the last 10 years, he had to eat through a tube, but he was a fighter. We were lucky to have those final 10 years.”
Several months after her husband’s death, Linford joined Match.com.
“I wasn’t really ready to date because I hardly ever followed up with anyone,” she admitted. “I was a mess, but I wanted to get back in the human race.”
The third man Linford met had many of the qualities she had loved in her husband. Larry Coveny was kind, gentle and funny and very romantic. He also could sing to her because he was the lead singer in the Cryin’ Shames and now performs with Scramble, a group comprising members of the Cryin’ Shames and The Buckinghams.
“Love second time around is the same,” said Coveny, who is divorced. “Love is love. New love is as good as old, if not better. Singing is part of me, so she’s lucky. I’m sensitive and romantic. Being of Italian descent means I’m affectionate. I’m a lover, not a fighter. I believe in treating a woman like a queen, with respect, admiration and equality, even though I have bigger biceps than she does!”
Although Linford, 62, says her husband was a tough act to follow, she says life is now great again.
“Love is not only for young people at all, romance is timeless,” she said. “It’s one of the things that makes me feel young again, and I’ll be happy to feel that way until I’m 100. I’m not really into the technical part of human interaction, I like to meet face to face. I think Valentine’s Day brings that out in all of us.”
A near-death experience led to some surprisingly positive changes for sales executive Paul Elam. Best of all is a new relationship with a woman 10 years his senior.
“Age is just a number and I absolutely firmly believe that,” said Elam, 46. “Sometimes, we act like a couple of goofball teenagers, something which would have made our previous partners’ eyes roll.”
Five years ago, Elam was run over by his neighbor while walking his dog at his former home in Aurora.
“I needed emergency brain surgery after suffering a traumatic brain injury,” he said. Doctors warned his wife that the surgery would have one of three outcomes — he would die, live the rest of his life in a vegetative state or need to learn to function again. But after six weeks of rehabilitation at Marianjoy Hospital, he made an amazing recovery.
“I had worked in advertising, always going at a hundred miles an hour,” he said. “It wasn’t all about the money, but I was always chasing the next bigger and better thing. After my accident, I was no longer comfortable doing that. I wanted to focus on being a parent and figuring out the next step.”
Elam sold his house and moved with his family to Naperville two years ago, but then he and his wife divorced.
“I hadn’t expected to meet anyone else so soon, but it was kismet,” he said.
While enjoying an evening out with friends at Potter’s Place in downtown Naperville, Elam struck up a conversation with Claudia Beshpiel, who was also newly divorced. The couple were amazed to find they not only had friends in common but had lived near each other in San Francisco many years ago.
“We had been at parties together with our previous partners and never knew,” said Beshpiel, who runs her own catering company. “It was destined to be.”
Beshpiel’s love of yoga is now leading to new career opportunities for the couple.
“When Paul told me he was having balance issues because of his accident, I pulled him into yoga,” she said. “He became a changed person.”
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Together, the couple researched traumatic brain injury yoga and are now in the process of training to run their own classes to help others.
“I spent most of my life chasing the dollar, but after going through what I have gone through with such a good physical outcome, I am filled with gratitude,” Elam said. “I want to give back and help people who are less fortunate than I.”
Elam said he and Beshpiel previously had six-figure incomes in their households, but that has changed.
“The change in our individual stature and paths has opened our eyes,” he said. “It’s not about chasing the next big thing. It’s not important to me anymore.”
Beshpiel agrees. “We don’t need stuff, we need experiences, companionship and empathy,” she said. “I had to wait until I reached my mid-50s to find out what life is all about.”
On Valentine’s Day, the couple will be hanging out together in the city.
“I used to have to figure out what flowers and gifts I had to buy,” Elam said. “Now it’s more about the gift of time.”
Hilary Decent is a freelance journalist who moved from England to Naperville in 2007.