Unexpected Joy, Part 3

What a Difference a Year Makes: How Life's Unexpected Setbacks Can Lead to Unexpected Joy
by Bob Guiney

(Page 3 of 3)

I've always said that I am someone who needs to have an epiphany before I make a major decision in my life. In this case, it was caused by the death of my grandmother-my mother's mother, who was one of my very best friends. She was a Southern belle, a beautiful soul, and she had a lovely singing voice as well. Singing has always been a big thing in our family. When she was young she was as gorgeous as a movie star, and she often said that she and Jennifer resembled each other. Gram aged into a plump, elegant older woman with a rosy face and white curls. She always made sure to wear her pearls and high heels when she went out-not to show off, but as a sign of respect for the person she was with. She believed in respecting others. During my time with the band, a lot of the guys I was hanging out with had the right look for rock-which is not always the right look for grandmothers. They had long hair, and some had tattoos, but my grandma treated them with the same courtesy that she did everyone else. In contrast, since I had grown my hair at the time, I started getting some attitude from people, as if they were making judgments about me based on my appearance, like they just assumed I was a loser who was doing drugs (which I wasn't). But she never bought into that kind of thinking.

One year, my mother (who was absolutely best friends with my grandma-they were practically inseparable) was driving my grandma back home from the cottage when Grandma said she wasn't feeling well, and that she was short of breath. My mom, fearful for Grandma's health, convinced her that they should go to the hospital the next day for an angioplasty, just to make sure she was okay.

After the doctors viewed the results of the angioplasty, they told us that she had so much heart blockage that she needed quadruple bypass surgery immediately. We were nervous about the procedure, of course, but also confident that in the end everything would be fine.

Before the surgery, we were all gathered in her hospital room, making her laugh hysterically. I in particular loved to make her laugh by telling the story of the first time I ever saw Jennifer (of course, totally overemphasizing the silly details). I described how one day I was standing by the side of the road, trying to fix a flat tire on my bike. Along came this gorgeous woman in a convertible. She was with a man, and they were toasting with Dom Pérignon, and as they drove past they splashed mud all over me. This detail never failed to crack her up. We all talked and laughed until it was time to leave. It was tough to walk out.

After the bypass surgery, she was upgraded and seemed to be on the road to recovery. Then, one afternoon, on a day that convinced me I had a kind of sixth sense-one that I did not want, mind you-I suddenly decided to go to my mother and dad's house. I don't know why-it was just a strong feeling that I should be there. When I got there, I learned that Grandma had just taken a turn for the worse. We rushed to the hospital, and we were all there with her while she passed away. It was awful. We all loved her so much.

The hardest part was knowing that my mom had lost her best friend. This was not even three years after she had lost her brother, who had died of a heart attack in his sleep, and her father, and my dad's dad-and now her mother. It was devastating. It was awful for all of us, but I think it was hardest on my mom.

Mom spent the first few weeks hardly eating or sleeping-just crying. Trying to be helpful, I swallowed my pain and grief to put on a show of strength that I hoped would give her strength. And so I didn't really grieve the loss of Grandma like I should have, even though I had loved her so much and now missed her so badly. This was a mistake that would come back to haunt me years later.

And as for the feeling that I had some kind of sixth sense, it was because I'd had the same experience-feeling the urgent need to pay an unexpected visit-the day my mom's dad passed, and I had also been with my Uncle Big Red the weekend before his death, and then with my Grandpa Guiney the week of his passing. The idea of having this sixth sense bothered me terribly, although when I mentioned it to my parents, they tried to convince me that it wasn't a bad thing and that I should find comfort in it. I later realized that they were right, and it was just an amazing coincidence that I do find remarkably comforting. But both were devastated by the family's losses. It was an impossible time for my family, a time when we were covered by a heavy shroud of sadness.

Grandma's death was not only a tragedy for me, but also a real wake-up call: I realized that life didn't last forever. We had to live for the present. I had first thought about proposing to Jennifer two years into our relationship, but I didn't because I didn't feel stable enough financially. Now I felt there would never be a perfect time; I just had to grab the bull by its horns. Even though I knew we had problems-namely, we could have such a hard time communicating with each other-I bought an engagement ring. I hid the diamond ring for a few days, unsure of exactly when to propose.

Then one afternoon, after having a few days off the road with the band, I came home to find Jennifer on the couch, staring sadly out at the balcony. I asked her what was wrong, and she turned to me and said, "Everything is slipping away." She had opened a cutting-edge clothing boutique and was realizing that it was no longer her passion. It wasn't doing as well as she would have hoped. (Apparently, at the time, East Lansing, Michigan, women were too practical for cosmopolitan styles like clingy off-the-shoulder blouses. It was all about The Gap and college-style apparel.) Jennifer always had such an excellent sense of fashion. Unfortunately, the women of East Lansing were not quite as into fashion at the time. In addition, I was on the road constantly, and she wasn't happy in the town where we lived. It was time for a move-both geographically and in our relationship.

"I'll never slip away," I told her. I pulled out the ring and took her hand. She trembled as I put the ring on her finger. She couldn't speak, but I knew by the way she clutched the ring to her chest that she would marry me. We held each other in silence and wept.

To this day, people who were there comment that our wedding was the prettiest they have ever been to. It was held on a golf course. We set up a tent and put down hardwood floors and had the band play dance songs from every era so that everybody-young and old-would enjoy the music. Jennifer was lovely in a simple, vintage-looking gown. What made her the most beautiful, though, were the tears of joy that shone in her beautiful blue eyes throughout the whole day. After the toast, I rendered her speechless when I got up on the stage and sang Elvis's "Love Me Tender" to her. I had, strangely, never before sung a love song directly to her. It was long overdue.

The question I kept asking myself in the days after she left me was: How did I get to this point? How did I get from the day of our wedding-with both of us so happy and our families and friends there as witnesses to our love-to now, this February night barely two and a half years later, when I was injured, divorced, and completely alone? I thought about that time I came home to find Jennifer in tears while listening to my song. I hadn't understood the reason for those tears until a week after she left me for good, when in a state of despair I riffled through my CDs. I popped them into the stereo and listened to them in the dark.

One song, "Slow 44," has the lyrics, We're still standing around in squares, wondering who's to blame/for all the years/gone by much quicker when you're young...

I wish I had understood what I was really feeling when I wrote those words. (I guess that's part of how we try to get though major disasters-by avoiding what's too painful even when it's right in front of us. It's a healthy denial that becomes a kind of self-protection.) The song was all about the strain of a relationship when you're young and trying to make your way in the world. That's exactly what I was doing-taking steps toward success, and in doing so I was leaving Jennifer and the feelings of doubt she was having about our relationship behind. Another line in the song is, You're still standing around, feeling proud with your Daddy's name. She never changed her last name after we were married, and in a lot of ways it hurt my feelings.

I like to think of myself as a modern Renaissance man. For example, my brother-in-law J.D. and I always would laugh and say that we'd love it if our wives made more money than we did, and he always said he'd love to be a househusband. I loved his attitude, but strangely when it came to the whole last-name issue, I was much more traditional. This again shows the disaster that was my thought process.

Jennifer explained that she had established herself as an individual-this was her name-and that changing it would mean having to seemingly erase who she had been and reestablish herself. I understood the logic of that, but I always took it to mean (rightly or wrongly) that she didn't want to be part of my family. At first I had been cool with it, but when things started to get bad, it meant more to me. Looking back, I'm not sure exactly what I thought a name change was going to solve, but it came to symbolize a lot.

Copyright © Robert Guiney, published by Jeremy P. Tarcher/Penguin, a member of Penguin Group (USA) Inc., all rights reserved, reprinted with permission from the publisher.

About the Author

Bob Guiney, known as the funny guy from ABC's The Bachelorette, may not have won the Bachelorette's hand, but he won America's heart. With five appearances in one month on The Oprah Winfrey Show (a record for any guest in the history of the show), Bob will be the next Bachelor on ABC's hit series to air in October and November. He co-owns a branch of a mortgage company in Detroit, Michigan.