A Love Story in south Georgia...

This is a love story, at its core.
Here is what happened to me in Blitchton, Georgia on the third day of my walk…a woman grabbed me around the neck and kissed my face and told me she loved me. Right in front of her husband. And he didn’t mind.
I was resting my feet at the only gas station in Blitchton, and waiting for my phone to charge. There was a woman working the counter, and two other female customers. An elderly, but very fit looking man came in and was yelling quite loudly and pointing in our general direction, “Come here! Come here! Help me!” Each of the women pointed at themselves and said, “ Me?” And he said, “No, no, no---HIM”, pointing at yours truly. I was thinking, “How rude, why not ask nicely?” but went outside with him.
As we neared his old pickup he explained that his wife was in the truck—I didn’t see her—and that she had fallen, and was stuck. Sure enough, she had fallen off the seat, down onto the floor, had one leg wedged in a painful position, and because she was fairly heavy was unable to extricate herself. She smiled up at me from her low position, and I said to her, "Pleased to meet you. Now what are you doing down there?"
With the help of another woman, we managed to get her out and in a standing position, none the worse for the wear. My job now was to physically lift her up and get her back seated as she was before she fell. She required a walker and couldnt get herself up on the seat. As I lifted her up and got her in place, she put her arms around me, kissed my hard on the side of my face and said, “I love you!” I kissed her back on her cheek, said, “I love you too” and let her go. Her husband thanked me profusely, telling me that she had Alzheimers and wasn’t in good shape mentally or physically, and that he had to do everything for her, but that since they had married for 63 years, (he was 88, she was 84) he didnt mind at all. He went on to tell me that he had been in the Reserves during WWII, and when he came back from flying C47’s to the Burma Road, he saw her at a dance, and said that she was the most beautiful woman he had ever seen and that he was going to marry her. They dated three times and got married shortly after.
Sixty three years later they are still a couple and live in a nice house with a pond, next to their daughter’s house.
They thanked me and drove away after getting gas, and I figured that would be it.
As I resumed walking, I noticed, about an hour later, the man, parked near a pond, tossing something in the water, and saw that his wife was still in the truck, watching him. On the same property a younger woman was hanging laundry. I called out to her and she came over. I asked her if she was related to the couple and she said that yes, she was their daughter. I related the story of her mom falling and the subsequent lift and kiss incident, and I expressed my admiration for her father, having taken it upon himself to take total care of his beloved wife. She laughed, and said that the truth was that both of her parents were suffering from Alzheimers and that she was caregiver for both of them and had been for several years. As we watched her father and mother drive off and almost get creamed by a car, she said, “See? He is getting so bad..he is going to kill someone one of these days. “
I can only hope that as their memories fade into the jumble of confusion that Alzheimers inevitably brings, that both B.E. and Annie Mae Roberts have one last clear thought: “ I am with the one I love the most in this world.”