T he story in Sunday’s paper of the middle-aged couple tying the knot after living together for several years was at once humorous and heart-rending.
Taken by themselves, the two, now Bruce and Helen Grice of New Edinburg, paint a portrait of themselves that evokes the rural South, living together unwedded but feeling a little guilty about that as a preacher went on about “shacking up” and then finally saying their “I do’s” on the banks of the Saline River. It could have been a scene in a movie, such was its raw authenticity.
Each part of the duo has been married before, more than once, but this union seems to be holding firm. As Bruce said, they give each other space and neither one worries about the other. If he decides to go to Kansas to hunt, Helen buys his license, and so it goes.
The story was a crowd pleaser had it just been left right there at the river bank. But that is only part of it, maybe not even the most important part of it. Suddenly, these two people in their mid-50s have a 1-year-old to care for. That part of the narrative became intertwined with their own life story on June 21, when a gunman killed four and injured more than a dozen in a shootout in nearby Fordyce.
Independent reporting for Pine Bluff & Jefferson County since 1879.
One of the killed was Callie Weems, 22. She was a nurse, and when the shooting rampage started, she of course went to the aid of one of the wounded, only to then be fatally shot herself. Weems was Helen’s daughter, and the now-motherless child, Ivy Mae, is being raised by Helen and her husband.
There were doubtless other reasons for Bruce and Helen to get married, but it was perhaps the sudden responsibility of having Helen’s grandchild to raise that pushed them to the water’s edge, that being the banks of the Saline River, where friends and family members joined them to witness their vows of devotion to each other.
Ivy Mae won’t remember her mother, sadly, but if it works out, she will have the benefit of the love and attention that another homelife will provide. It’s a sad story, but within that sadness rises the love for a child and the devotion of family. Not that she recognizes it, but Ivy Mae is living through one of the worst experiences life can produce. She’s also living through one of the best.