Did you see the news story the other day involving the sudden wedding of two members of the Ukrainian Defense Forces?

Lesya Ivashchenko and Valeriy Filimonov weren’t planning to hold their ceremony during war time, but decided to make their vows on Sunday at a checkpoint on the outskirts of Kyiv.

This year would have been my parents’ 70th anniversary. They were married in New Haven on a Tuesday, while Dad was on leave from the Army.

Dad had a three-day pass from Fort Dix in New Jersey, where he was stationed. It took several tries to get the leave approved, but there was no way he was missing his own nuptials.

Dad’s wedding gift from the Army was waiting on his bunk when he returned – orders to ship out to Korea.

Forty-four years later, my parents revisited the city of Seattle, where Dad had spent his final night in the States before boarding a ship headed into the Korean Conflict.

All those years later, Mom remembered well the endless weeks apart.

That Year

After we married a chasm
of the year we never saw each other
wartime
we were too young to know our luck
it wasn’t more

For us it was forever
the bed barely warmed
the dowry of our speaking spent

Forty four years later on a tour
we found our high Seattle room
1953
that night we came together
in the port you left so long ago
that missing year

~ joan vayo 8 October 1997

There were no phone calls during that missing year, but lots of letters and even the results of a few photo shoots in the back yard.

The newlyweds in Ukraine will also have an unsteady start to their married life together.

May God bless their union and grant them many decades of happiness together.

And peace.

“That Year” © 1997 Joan Vayo. All rights reserved.

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