A Love Story.

In 1939, Annie Spero met Joe Fischetti at a Glenn Miller concert at a dance hall in New York City. Annie was 23 years old, and 5 feet tall - she was struggling to see the band over the crowd. Joe came up behind her and tapped her on the shoulder, asking if she needed any help. Anna nodded and offered him her elbows, and he lifted her up to watch the rest of the show. They were together from then on.

In 1941, Joe was drafted to fight in WWII. They had heard that married men were coming home from the war earlier, so they quickly got married in a courthouse. For the next 4 years, they wrote letters back and forth almost every day. Annie waited for him for those 4 years, and the very week he came home, they were married in church. Though she was legally married (what she calls "in name only"), they did not consider themselves married until their church wedding in 1945.

According to Annie (my husband's grandmother), they were married 48 years. Joe died 2 years before what would have been their 50th anniversary, though technically speaking, they were legally married for 52 years.

"We lived a great life," she says. "When we argued, we did it calmly and never yelled. And we laughed all the time."