I went to live in Israel at the end of 1978. Garry was working and stayed, to no one’s surprise, in Boston. We saw each other once during that time, but he wrote me almost everyday. Remarkably, I didn’t see anything odd about it though since I came back to the U.S. in August 1987, he hasn’t written a single letter to anyone.

Everyday I got a missive, typed on his newsroom typewriter, telling me about his day, week, what was going on in the news and his world. Telling me what a great person I am. It was a bushel of positive support. Given my circumstances living in Jerusalem with an abusive and none-too-bright jerk … it raised my spirits significantly and was the fuel on which I was able to keep going.

He came to visit for a week once. Interesting timing. It was my son’s (his Godson’s) Bar Mitzvah. Also the week the War in Lebanon started. Garry didn’t come alone, but was in the company of my son’s father (my first husband) — also Garry’s best friend.

The war came one night. We couldn’t go up North. Channel 7 — run then as now by a bunch of morons — refused to believe his scoop that a war had begun in the Middle East. Because it wasn’t on the wires yet. What IS the definition of a scoop?

So we didn’t get up north, but I toted him all over Jerusalem and Bethlehem — anywhere we could go without being blocked by tanks or troop movements.

When finally, my life in Israel burned to ashes, Garry was there to welcome me home and glue me back together. The rest, as they say, is history.

For just short of 9 years, I was across an ocean. Somehow we grew closer. Older, too. More appreciative of the relationship we had that somehow we hadn’t appreciated before I left.

Pretty soon (skipping past the complexities of him extracting one girl friend from his apartment and me getting a legal Israeli divorce while living in the U.S.), we got married.

We have rarely been apart for me than a few days since then, not counting my multiple incarcerations in hospitals for one or another near-death experience.

Destiny. It gets you. You can run, but you cannot hide. I wasn’t running or hiding, but somehow, Garry and I kept passing each other on the way to yet another wrong relationship.

These days, I’m happy as a clam right where I am. Amazed that somehow, through time, space, and the weird twists of life’s path, we ended up where we belong. I’m not going anywhere. This time, it’s till death do us part.

Categories: #Photography, Daily Prompt, Garry Armstrong, Love, Photo A Week Challenge

Tags: Daily prompt, destiny, DPchallenge, karma, love, love story, travel