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Good marriages are difficult to come by, so we asked some Roanoke Valley couples who’ve found success with each other to talk about how they do it.
Dan Smith
In an age when many of our institutions are in chaos, there appears to be a ray of light—like the glint of a diamond—in the midst of it all. Marriage, which has been declared dead or irrelevant, or both in recent years, is on the rebound. So to speak.
Author Tara Parker-Pope (“For Better: The Science of a Good Marriage”) wrote several years ago that, “… modern marriages are getting more and more resilient. With each generation, we’re getting a little better about picking mates. A different kind of marriage is emerging in this century.”
In the late 1970s and early1980s, the divorce rate climbed slightly above 50 percent, giving the distinct impression that the days of “Leave It to Beaver” marriages would exist on TV alone in the future. A quick look now, however, shows that 60 percent of marriages are succeeding and the figure is trending upward. The New York Times has announced: “If current trends continue, nearly two-thirds of marriages will never involve a divorce.” The website findthehome.com recently listed the 18 least-divorced states and Virginia, with its population of 8 million, finished No. 12 at 9.9 percent.
Taking all that into account and looking at the family orientation of the Roanoke Valley, we went looking for some good marriages and found a wide variety of couples enjoying wedded bliss in solid relationships, not all of them traditional.
Steve and Billie Sue Musselwhite have known each other since 8th and 10th grades when he was 14 and she 12—54 years—and they’ve been married for 46 of those years. They live in the large Vinton house Billie Sue grew up in and are surrounded by their children and grandchildren. The house, laughs Billie Sue, “feels like a motel sometimes, but we love it.”
They actually spent some time away from each other while getting educated, he at Marshall University, she at Radford College, and their relationship was “on and off” during that period, she says. In Steve’s senior year, with him having joined the Army reserves, “I decided she was the one I wanted. We had dated lots of people,” but it came down to the two of them.
They are philosophical about their many years together. “I don’t want to sit here and say the 46 years [of marriage] have been perfect,” says Steve. “We’ve made mistakes, had our priorities misplaced, but we learned to share God together. We started doing devotions 16-17 years ago” and that has evolved into a prison ministry they share.
Through the years Billie Sue “focused on family and I focused on work,” says Steve, who is a partner in MT Holdings and president of Musselwhite Associates, real estate and insurance. She manages the office at Musselwhite Associates, a role she fell into. Together they have worked closely with the Miss Virginia Pageant for 40 years.
“She’s my best friend,” says Steve. “I’d rather spend time with her than with anybody else.”
Billie Sue talks of the importance of “spending time together,” still dating: “If we were not still holding hands, we’d be in trouble.” She insists they’ve “learned from the rough times and grown as a couple. If it were not for the rough times, we wouldn’t have the marriage we have today.”
Michael and Amanda Mansfield met, appropriately, because of their love of theater. He is a high-tech guy at Lee Hartman and she is in donor relations at Virginia Western Community College, but each has a powerful local reputation in live theater. They met while performing in “Flyboy,” a Centerpieces lunchtime play at Mill Mountain Theatre and nine years ago were married. She has two daughters and he has one, so they had to combine their families.
This was a marriage of mature, settled people (he is 58, she’s 53) and they knew immediately that the children were equal partners. “If they said ‘no,’” says Michael, “then it could not continue.” The “yes” was unanimous and enthusiastic. “The girls were involved in the proposal on the Blue Ridge Parkway,” says Michael. “We told Amanda we were going to the opera.” And an opera it was.
Michael insists that a good marriage “deserves the best of you” and to that end “we work together in all we do.” He talks of respect, caring and “avoiding pitfalls. There are things you can say that can damage [the relationship] forever.” Being supportive and helpful are vital and “avoid ridiculous criticism when it’s not warranted. We’re not 20.”
“We’ve learned what is important and what is precious,” says Amanda. We recognize that what we have is truly special.”
“We enjoy being with each other,” says Michael. “We’d rather go out and experience together, discuss what we saw, listen to each other.”
Amanda says she is organized and goal-oriented while Michael is spontaneous and disorganized, but they work together creating a positive from the differences. “We’re not in competition,” says Michael. Their time together, says Amanda, has been less than a decade, “but it feels a lifetime longer.”
... for the rest of this story and more from our September/October 2017 issue, Subscribe today, view our FREE interactive digital edition or download our FREE iOS app!