He Stopped Loving Her Today

Country music legend George Jones died today at age 81. Jones was hard living, hard drinking, and sufficiently unreliable that he earned the name “No Show Jones” for his habit of skipping concerts. According to Associate Press, Jones wrote in his memoir, “In the 1970s, I was drunk the majority of the time. If you saw me sober, chances are you saw me asleep.”

Jones will be remembered for songs such as “No Show Jones,” the heartbreaker “She Thinks I Still Care,” and for his duets with his third (of four) wife, country singer Tammy Wynette.

But by far his biggest hit was the tearjerker ballad, “He Stopped Loving Her Today.” The song is the story about a man who, after a breakup still loved the same woman. In fact, he never got over her, never stopped loving her until he died. The song is set at his funeral. The AP story says:

In 1980, a 3-minute song changed his life. His longtime producer, Billy Sherrill, recommended he record “He Stopped Loving Her Today,” a ballad by Curly Putnam and Bobby Braddock. …Jones was convinced the song was too “morbid” to catch on. But “He Stopped Loving Her Today,” featuring a string section that hummed, then soared, became an instant standard and virtually canonized him. His concert fee jumped from $2,500 a show to $25,000.
 “There is a God,” he recalled.

The success of “He Stopped Loving Her Today” should probably not be added to the classic arguments for the existence of God alongside the ontological and cosmological arguments. Nonetheless, the song makes me ask a troubling question: When is it best to “just get over it” (whatever “it” is) and when is something so valuable that it shouldn’t be gotten over regardless of the price of hanging on?

I’ve always been inclined to view the man in the song as obsessive compulsive, sort of a male, benign, and generally harmless version of Miss Havisham from Great Expectations. On the other hand, perhaps even unrequited love is love worth treasuring.

As we age it’s time to rummage through our literal attic and basement as well as our emotional attic and basement asking, “Trash or treasure?” Bitterness, fears, and resentments are clearly trash. Throw them out; they’re poisoning your system. But love? That’s not quite so simple, is it?