FIRST KISS
GARINGER WEDDING, AUGUST 10, 1947.
Besame Mucho — CONSUELO VELÁZQUEZ, 1940
Lots of sweethearts celebrate Valentine’s Day, but for David Garinger, February 14 is unforgettable. That’s because on that date in 1947, he kissed his future wife for the first time.
They’d gone out on a double date and were sitting in a Hudson coupe, listening to the radio. “I had my arm around Zelma, sitting close. I smelled her sweetness. Her dark shining hair and sparkling blue eyes worked their magic on me. Our lips met for the very first time … it seemed so right. Truly she was my Valentine.” David penned that flowery description of their first kiss 52 years after that date. He added a PS: “She’s still my Valentine.”
And now after more than six decades of marriage, it still seems right. Zelma smiled as he read his prose. She was just 16 when they met at Los Angeles Pacific College. David was instantly smitten with the young beauty, but Zelma said, “I didn’t want to go out with him. He was too old!” In fact she told her father, “Some old Marine wants to date me.”
He’d just turned 23.
David had left school at 17 and learned the construction trade before enlisting in the Marine Corps in 1942. After stateside duty, he shipped out from Camp Pendleton to the South Pacific where he spent 38 months—most of it on Banica Island. His duties weren’t too onerous (he was a driver for a general), but while living in tents and Quonset huts, he dreamed of building a real home and a family.
Zelma knew of David before they met because her best friend had dated him for awhile—in fact that friend wrote to him the entire time he was overseas. But that relationship came to naught and once David met Zelma, he knew exactly what and who he wanted.
His war service forced him to grow up quickly, and with that maturity came patience. That “old Marine” also just happened to know a thing or two about persistence, and after some convincing, Zelma agreed to be his date for the college Christmas banquet in December 1946. By August 10, 1947, she was his wife. Wedding photos show a beaming couple who are often caught laughing. “The ring bearer stepped on my floor-length veil,” Zelma said. Then she giggled. “It came right off!”
They spent their honeymoon in a cabin at Big Bear Lake. They boated, bicycled and fished. Maybe some new brides wouldn’t want to bait hooks on their honeymoon, but Zelma said, “I grew up fishing with my dad.”
Too David’s dismay, their first home was a tiny Quonset hut courtesy of student housing for veterans. Zelma didn’t mind it a bit. “It was like playing house!” Though she continued to take some college classes, it wasn’t long before her maternal instinct kicked in. “We were in veterans’ housing,” she recalled. “Everyone was having babies.”
DAVID GARINGER, 1945.
In 1949, the Garingers welcomed the first of their four children. The following years were eventful and filled with many moves. David continued his education at Seattle Pacific University, graduating in 1951. He worked as a pastor, a carpenter and general contractor, and the family moved wherever his work took him. “It’s amazing looking back,” said Zelma. “Life was so busy. We must have had hard times; it just doesn’t seem that way to me.”
Her love of the outdoors served her well when their children were young. “We always camped,” Zelma said. “When the kids were little we used a station wagon and we all slept outside. Eventually, we graduated to a camper and then a trailer.”
After the birth of their fourth child in 1961, Zelma returned to college and graduated with a teaching degree. “After the children left, life was really different,” she admitted. Still, the couple adjusted to their new lives. Zelma taught elementary school for 30 years and David didn’t retire until he was 75.
When the couple moved from California to Washington to be near their youngest child, they didn’t settle into a retirement community. Instead, they chose a home in a bustling neighborhood filled with young families. They enjoy their neighbors and having children around them. The Garingers’ active lifestyle has continued in their retirement years. “We went on an Alaskan cruise for our 50th anniversary,” Zelma said. “From then on we just kept going. We really got the bug.” The couple has visited 31 countries in the past 10 years.
DAVID GARINGER, HAWAII, 1946.
Like many married folks, the Garingers admit to being opposites. “He’s usually positive and I’m a worrier,” Zelma said. When asked about their favorite travel adventure, David said, “I think China was our most exciting trip.” However, his wife chose Norway. “We took a train trip through the mountains,” she said. “It was so beautiful.”
Zelma describes her husband as extroverted and vigorous. “He still has excess energy,” she said, laughing. “I can still shovel snow when my neighbors will let me,” David said. Zelma is more sedate and enjoys quiet hobbies like quilting and reading, but over the years they’ve learned the necessary skills of compromise and negotiation. “It helps to have our own space,” said Zelma. She has her quilting room on one side of their home, and her husband has his office on the other. He writes, paints in oil, and keeps busy helping at a nearby church camp.
David wishes couples would heed the wisdom of long-married folks. Sitting close to Zelma he patted her knee and sighed. “Young people today give up too quickly,” he said. While differences can cause conflict, he’s grown to appreciate his wife’s savvy ways. “She’s always been so sensible about money,” he said. “Couples need to talk about money.”
Pragmatism aside, he hasn’t lost his romantic streak. Each morning he brings his wife a cup of coffee in bed. “He likes to celebrate things,” Zelma said. “On my birthday last week he brought my coffee and a little piece of birthday cake with a candle lit.” David smiled at his bride. “She’s always busy and upbeat. She just keeps going.”
Sixty plus years after that first Valentine’s kiss, their advice to others lovers is straightforward. “It’s give and take,” David said. “You decide you want to be together and cooperate with each other.”
“Don’t expect it to be perfect,” said Zelma. “Love is a decision.”
“Just keep getting along. It’s okay to have differences of opinion—you don’t always have to agree.”—David Garinger
DAVID AND ZELMA GARINGER, 2008.
Photo courtesy Christopher Anderson, Spokesman Review
David Garinger died June 5, 2014