35 years to find a love that was always there

By Allison Woodham / allison@gulfcoastmedia.com
Posted 7/7/16

This is a story about love and commitment, distorted through dishonesty and almost ruined by the actions of others. Here is Ryan and Leah Miller’s story.

Leah and Ryan first met in Lawndale, California, as playmates in a daycare center operated …

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35 years to find a love that was always there

Posted

This is a story about love and commitment, distorted through dishonesty and almost ruined by the actions of others. Here is Ryan and Leah Miller’s story.

Leah and Ryan first met in Lawndale, California, as playmates in a daycare center operated by Leah’s grandmother. Leah’s family moved to Tennessee when she was 4 years old.

In the fall of 1970, Ryan was deployed to Vietnam; he was 19 years old.

While in Vietnam, Leah sent Ryan letters which turned into a love and, hopefully, a future together. Ryan returned home August of 1971. He wanted to find his love,

but Leah’s mother plotted behind their backs a new course for her daughter’s life, blocking attempts Ryan made to contact her. In an attempt to bury Ryan in the past, Leah’s mother told her, “Honey, Ryan was killed in Vietnam.”

Time went on and Ryan and Leah did get married to others; Ryan says it is also the oddest part.

“Leah’s marriage was all but an arranged marriage to a boy she did not love, but was set up by her mother,” he said. “I married at my father’s advice. After losing Leah, being called a ‘baby killer’ at the airport, I became quite callous and frankly, started

getting into trouble.”

Ryan’s father told him to either find a family to raise or find a jail to rot in.

“I found a young woman with a newborn,” Ryan said. “I told her I didn’t love her, but her son needed a father and I wanted the job. We married three months later.”

Leah did not marry for love, as Ryan didn’t, and they were both married to separate people on the same day.

Following his father’s death on Sept. 18, 2005, Ryan sent out 350 “thank you” letters to everyone in his father’s old pop-up address book.

“Most of the letters came back but Leah’s grandmother, at 92 years old, received one of the notes,” Ryan said. “In knowing how much she loved me — as each year they would reread all my letters from Vietnam — she called Leah.”

“Honey, you’re not going to believe this … Ryan is not dead, and I’ve found him,” Leah’s grandmother said.

It took Leah a few months to contact Ryan, and when she did, Ryan had no idea who she was.

“Then she said, ‘Ryan, you knew me as Leah Heartaway when you were in Vietnam,’”

Ryan explained. “Honestly, the world stopped at the very moment as it hit me. That was the first time I had ever heard her voice: Jan. 26, 2006.”

The couple’s first face-to-face meeting was April 17, 2006. It was during this meeting that the love these two felt for each other 35 years ago was as alive and vibrant as it was back in 1971. Ryan asked Leah to marry him the next day.

In February of 2006, Ryan began writing a book, “Echoes in the Rain,” as a vehicle to

communicate his love to Leah, how Ryan adored her and how she saved his life in Vietnam. However, after Leah and Ryan got together, the book had served its purpose. It became a saved file on Microsoft Word.

“It wasn’t until last year, and at the urging of our friends, that our story should be told,” Ryan said. “I really didn’t want to write it, as our story is very personal.”

Ryan and Leah’s friends encouraged him to have the story published, as it is one of hope, never giving up on your dreams and believing destiny will always find its way.

“Then I remembered all the guys who received ‘Dear John letters,’ and simply gave up,” he said. “Then I thought that maybe, just maybe, I could bring hope and show that if you pursue your dreams with a passion and faith and stay the course. You will

never lose.”

Right now, Ryan’s book can be purchased on Amazon Books and CreateSpace. Locally, his work is available at Page and Palette in Fairhope and Book Exchange in Foley.

“We’re soaking up the sun in paradise and loving like kids,” Ryan said. “I have decided to write for pleasure and supplement our retirement. I have three more books to be released in August.”

Ryan said Leah’s letters he received in Vietnam lifted him to do things he alone could never have been capable of.

“After you’ve been wet and cold for a few weeks, never knowing what was lurking beyond your line of sight, you have a tendency to give up, and many did,” Ryan said. “But with Leah via her timely letters, her playful and caressing words, she kept me focused and committed to finding my way home to her. Nothing Vietnam could throw at me would erode my desire and passion to make her my wife. I carried that same feeling for 35 years after Vietnam.”