How Do You Know? Another Love Story from Author Ben Bryant


Elizabeth, the heroine of my personal

love story,

and I watched a movie with that title last night. It was a fun “Rom-Com”. We had a few laughs and enjoyed it. This is not a movie review but this short essay was provoked by that title.

Before I met Elizabeth (then called Betsy) in 1967 I had thought maybe I was in love three or four times and once thought that I had (again maybe) met my future wife.

When I met Betsy – actually when I first laid eyes on her – I knew. No maybe about it.

Excerpt from Three Stages Chapter 9: Sitting in the front row was a lovely young woman with a Shetland Sheep Dog at her feet. I didn’t know who she was but it was as though there was a pin spotlight on her and all the others in the room faded from view. Her presence hit me like a velvet sledge hammer. It was confusing.

And another, a page later: I asked Betsy if I could take her to lunch. With some reluctance she accepted and we went to the snack bar across from the Inn. As we were eating our sandwiches I told her that I felt like I knew her. She replied that she knew we’d never met. I agreed that we’d not met before, that wasn’t what I meant. I just had the feeling that I knew her. This was the absolute truth.

I did know her and I knew she was the one.

To answer the question posed by the title: I don’t intellectually know how I knew. The knowing was in my heart. The heart, unlike the mind, doesn’t express itself in words but in feelings.

I just knew.

And forty-eight years and five months since that day – after marriage, trial, tumult, separation, divorce and remarriage – I (we) still know.

Author Ben Bryant with his (twice) wife Elizabeth Hepburn at their Wedding #2

Author Ben Bryant with his (twice) wife Elizabeth Hepburn at their Wedding #2

The third volume of my memoirs tells the tale of our divorce and remarriage.

Click here to get Waiting for Elizabeth

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