Making Marriage Work

Columbus, Ohio, lawyers Lee Grogan, Jr., and wife, Lynn, specialize in divorce. But at home, they specialize in marriage -- 23 years of it.

Is it a contradiction for a divorce lawyer to have a solid marriage?

Not in Columbus.

Lee Grogan, Sr., and wife, Jane, have been married 51 years. Milton and Elsa Hirsch have gone 50 years. John and Vicky Partin, Seth and Linda Harp, and Leslie and Bonnie Cohn have all been married more than 35 years, and Bill and Becky Rumer join the 30-year club later this month.

The common thread? The husband in each of those marriages is a divorce attorney.

"It doesn't surprise me," Bill Rumer says with a little laugh. "We've learned."

"You are basically talking about committed people," Lee Grogan, Jr. says. "I know all of the people we are talking about and they are committed to relationships in general. Most have long-term friendships. They are committed to their families. They are also committed to their profession. Most of them would probably be in long-term marriages whether they were divorce lawyers or not."

That doesn't mean a peace warrant isn't needed every now and then.

"At times we grumble about our spouses, and I am sure, at times, our spouses grumble about us," Seth Harp says.

The Columbus Ledger-Enquirer [Columbus, Ohio] talked to each of these couples to find out what makes their marriages work. Here's what they found:

Lee and Lynn Grogan, 23 Years
Ask Lynn Grogan why their marriage has lasted.

"Mutual respect and great sex," she says.

Ask Lee, and you get a little different answer.

"Friendship and respect," he says.

They met as students at Davidson College in North Carolina. When they both wound up at the Mercer University School of Law, things got serious.

She admires his "sense of always doing the right thing."

He admires her determination.

They have three children and say family is at the heart of their relationship. Nothing unusual there.

But they are also law partners. "I can't tell you why it works," Lee says. "I used to think I could, but I can't."

Lynn thinks she knows. In most wedding vows people promise to love, honor, respect and cherish one another. The key word, Lynn says, is respect.

"I have always said that respect is the basis for every relationship -- husband and wife, parent and child, friends," she says. "There has to be a mutual respect. Trust is at the core of that respect. Once you violate the core -- the center of that golf ball that holds everything together -- all the rest of it starts falling apart."

Marriage is not easy -- the Grogans see that every day.

"Being married is the hardest job you will ever do," Lynn says. "Once you cut away from the starry-eyed, butterflies-in-the stomach feeling, it's a job. There are days you don't want to be in that job. And then there are the days you couldn't imagine being any place else."

Lee says he's had good role models: His parents have been together more than 51 years, and his father is also a divorce attorney.

"It's the norm for me," Lee says. "My father's grandparents were married more than 75 years. It is the way I was brought up -- when you go into a marriage you are going to be there for a long time."

Lynn, who has a reputation for being tough, says being a divorce lawyer actually enlightens her role as a wife.

"I will hear people say why they are getting a divorce -- and I will think, 'Oh my gosh, I have done that,'" she says. "Then I will go home and try to fix it."

If they had to hire an attorney for a divorce, both say they would hire Lee Grogan, Sr.

"He would make us stay together," Lynn says. Lee puts it another way: "He would make Lynn be nice."

Milton and Elsa Hirsch, 50 Years
Milton Hirsch has been a divorce lawyer 56 years -- six years longer than he has been married to his wife, Elsa.

As he prepares for a divorce trial, he can generally tell why the marriage failed. It boils down to one character trait.

"You can usually know which party is selfish and which party is unselfish," he says. "If you are unselfish, you won't destroy each other."

They met at the University of Georgia in the early 1950s. Milton was dating Elsa's roommate.

Milton came home to Columbus to start a law practice and Elsa, a journalism major from Tallahassee, Fla., got her first job at a Columbus radio station.

She rented an apartment from Hirsch's father.

"She became part of the family," Milton says.

When she threatened to leave for Atlanta, "he asked me to marry him, and I have been here 50-something years," Elsa says.

For Milton, being a divorce attorney can be demanding, too.

"It's much more personal, much more emotional," Milton says. "You are dealing every day with somebody's life. You are trying to help them through one of the worst times of their life."

He says he is probably a better divorce attorney now than when he started.

"I am more in a position to help people make decisions now," he says.

Milton and Elsa say marriage isn't easy, either.

"Caring and family are more important than looking for things to disagree about," Milton says.

"It has been good and bad," Elsa adds. "It can't all be good."

Seth and Linda Harp, 38 Years
"I have always said when people first marry there is a whole lot of lust and not a whole lot of understanding," Seth says. "The longer you are married, the more you understand each other."

There's another upside to decades of marriage.

"As you stay married, you start to see the investments and decisions you have made over the years start to come to fruition," he says. "So many people destroy themselves with divorce."

Divorce can be devastating in many ways.

"Divorce lawyers stay married because they see what happens when you get a divorce," Seth says. "There is a Harvard study that says people who go through a divorce can expect it to wipe out three-quarters of the potential wealth they will create in a lifetime. You should think about that, first and foremost, before you get married."

It's simple dollars and sense.

"The religious side says it is a lifelong commitment," Seth says. "But the financial side also says it is a lifelong commitment."

Seth and Linda met on a blind date when he was a Marine officer stationed in Albany, N.Y., and she was a teacher in Camilla, N.Y.

"We got married, first of all, because we love one another," Seth says. "Second of all, we trust each other. We committed to make decisions together, plan our lives together, strategize together and communicate with each other."

Linda says the best way to remain married is to remove the obstacles that can destroy it.

"You don't let anything stand in the way of staying together," she says.

Years ago, Linda received some free marriage advice from a neighbor who had been married longer than she had. When times get tough, you stay married because you made a commitment years earlier, the neighbor told Linda.

"And the way you do that," Linda says, "is you do go back and look at why you made that commitment. What made you make that decision?"

Lee and Jane Grogan, 51 Years
Ask Jane Grogan what 51 years of marriage have taught her and you get a quick answer.

"It tells me I got a good husband," she says.

When the Grogans married in August of 1954, "we married with plans to be married the rest of our lives," Lee says.

"We never considered it would not last," Jane says.

It's working out that way.

When the Grogans got married, divorce was not an easy way to end a
marriage. The introduction of no-fault divorces about 40 years ago
changed that.

"It has contributed to a lot more divorces," Lee says. "They
are just much easier to get. All one party has to say is, 'I am not
going to live with you,' or, 'The marriage is irretrievably broken.'"

Over the years, he has left his work at the office.

"He just doesn't bring it home," Jane says. "Sometimes I am curious, but I have learned not to ask."

Other things they've learned: To share common goals and values -- and not to take themselves too seriously.

So how did she know long ago she was making the right decision when she married Lee?

"I don't know," she says. "I just knew it."

Bill and Becky Rumer, 29 years
A successful marriage, Bill Rumer says, boils down to one thing.

"You got to find somebody to love that loves you," he says.

Bill and Becky, who married in 1976, have stayed in love. They reached 30 years on Feb. 21.

"The best thing I ever did was marry Bill Rumer," she says. "It is the most important decision I ever made."

Bill knew children were going to be important when he married Becky.

"When we were still courting, she had been a baby sitter to
several families that had foster children," Bill says. "She told me
then she wanted to be a foster family. She was the most beautiful girl
I had ever dated, so I said it was OK with me."

They have had seven foster children in their care over the last 20 years.

The Rumers have four children. The two oldest are in college,
and the two youngest, both adopted out of the foster-care system, live
at home.

"I know I am being heard," Becky says. "And I know he is going
to make decisions based on his understanding of what is important to
me."

Bill doesn't see the conflict between his work and his long-term marriage.

"It's just what I do," he says.

Early in his relationship with a new client, Bill tells the
story of Aunt Tilley's clock. It is his way of setting the tone for the
divorce.

His philosophy:

• If you inherited something or brought it into the marriage, "we'll argue about that."
• "If you can prove George Washington slept in that bed, we can argue about that."
• Everything else is just stuff, and "you don't just argue about stuff."

Which brings us to the figurative Aunt Tilley's clock. "It's
an old clock that doesn't even run," he says. "You picked it up at a
yard sale."

As stuff is being divided, Bill refers to the last item as Aunt Tilley's clock.

"You want to invest the anger and fight over one last thing," he
says. "I have even had clients look at me and say, 'This is Aunt
Tilley's clock, right?' "

John and Vicky Partin, 38 Years
John and Vicky Partin's first date got canceled.

A sorority sister of Vicky's set the two up for a hayride -- Nov. 23, 1963.

The date never happened because President Kennedy was
assassinated that day. When they finally met months later at a church
function, Vicky was dating a pig farmer back home in Pulaski, Tenn. The
pig farmer wouldn't come to Nashville for social events, so John stood
in.

Eventually, she dumped the pig farmer for the future lawyer.

Was it an upgrade?

"Her mother and father probably wondered," John says. "It's worked out OK. Eventually, her parents seemed to like me."

They married Aug. 6, 1967, just before John's second year of law
school at the University of Virginia, and began their life together in
Charlottesville, Va.

John says marriage doesn't ever feel like a job.

"I have never thought it was hard to be with Vicky," he says. "I have never sensed the struggle day-to-day."

Any time there is a major decision to make, they make it together.

"That's the way it has always been," she says.

After nearly four decades, they still use just one checkbook.

"We have a few credit cards, but everything we charge gets recorded in that checkbook," Vicky says.

"I am blessed because I got her," he says.

Leslie and Bonnie Cohn, 36 Years
Leslie Cohn met Bonnie
when they were teenagers. He went to Columbus High, she went to Lanier
High in Macon, Ga. They were on a blind date at a synagogue youth
function.

Through high school, they would greet each other briefly after football games. From time to time, they would write letters.

They hooked back up in college when Bonnie, an Emory student,
would visit friends at the University of Georgia, where Cohn attended.

Then one day it turned serious.

"I saw this cute girl walking down Lumpkin," Leslie says. "She
had her back to me. When I passed her, I recognized it was Bonnie."

He saw her walk into a dorm. When he got home, he called the dorm to see if she was registered. She was.

"We started dating that night," Leslie says.

They were married on July 27, 1969.

Today, Leslie sees what lack of communication can do to a marriage on a daily basis.

"A lot of people can't make it because they refuse to
communicate," he says. "If you can't communicate, you can't solve your
problems."

And Bonnie says working through problems isn't easy.

"You have to be willing to work through the really hard times,"
she says. "I think sometimes couples give up too early. It takes time
to fix problems. It doesn't happen overnight."

Leslie and the other divorce attorneys hear the same question on a regular basis.

"People will come in and say, 'I love them, but I can't live
with them. What should I do?'" Leslie says. "I always say, 'Listen, if
you came here for me to tell you if you should or should not get a
divorce, you came to the wrong place.' I tell them I have been married
X-number of years. It's obvious I prefer marriage.

"Who am I to tell somebody they should get a divorce?"

Source: Columbus Ledger-Enquirer. Powered by YellowBrix.