KEEGO HARBOR, Mich. (WXYZ) — For 31 years, Marshall and Janis Rice have been a team.
“We met at a dance,” Janis revealed.
“Back in ’93,” Marshall said.
“I’m not able to walk. I have multiple sclerosis and Marshall came up to me and asked if I wanted to dance and I said, 'Sure if you want to hold me up,' and so he has been holding me up ever since,” Janis said.
“To be very truthful, I did not want to fall in love… we really seemed to… like each other and that’s very important. You got to like each other first.”
The couple married two years after that first dance, and blended their families to begin a life together.
“You don’t have to have everything in common, because that would be pretty boring… and we really haven’t been very bored,” Marshall said.
“We have a refrigerator magnet that says 'I love you more today than I did yesterday and yesterday you really ticked me off,'” he joked.
When asked how they handle the hard times and what advice would they give to couples to get through them, Janis said, “We’ve had an awful lot of issues to deal with. I have to say, a lot of it’s because of me, because I’m ill, supposedly. I’ve been in the hospital and rehab and broken things and he’s been with me the whole time. It really taught me what a wonderful man I have."
Now 30-plus years since that first dance, Marshall and Janis have raised their families together, created a business together, and just recently published a children’s book — together.
On Valentine’s Day and every day, they choose to be a team.
“Do you have any parting words of wisdom for couples, or people who are single who are watching this and thinking one day they hope to be as fortunate as the two of you?" Sarah Michals asked the couple.
“I’d say, stick it out,” Marshall said.
