Barbara Spence still keeps a box full of memories of her husband, Maynard: birthday cards, letters, and little flowers made from napkins. But the most moving thing is that some of those messages appeared long after he died in the September 11, 2001 attacks.
The couple had been exchanging love notes for more than ten years. Maynard used to hide them in different places around the house, without needing a special occasion to remind her how much he loved her.
On September 11, Maynard was on the 100th floor of the North Tower of the World Trade Center for a work meeting. Barbara spent hours waiting for news, clinging to the hope that he might emerge alive.
Finally, in April of the following year, some of his remains were found among the rubble. For her, that moment definitively confirmed that he would not return.
Soon afterward, while looking for a recipe in a cookbook, she found one of his notes hidden next to the recipe for cookies he loved.
“I took the cookbook out, and the note was there. I started to cry”, she recalled.
Twenty-five years after that tragedy, Barbara looked through the box again and was surprised to discover how many memories she had kept.
“He thought he was the luckiest man in the world and never wanted me to forget how much he loved me”, she said.
And, despite the passage of time, her feelings remain unchanged: “I feel that I still love him as much as I did 25 years ago”.