Perfectly Mismatched

Michael Patronella helped teach his wife Allyson, who is quieter by nature, to speak her mind. (Photo: stpimages.com)

Ask any long-time married couple, and it’s safe to bet you’ll hear a consensus: A good marriage takes work.

So how is it that, with as much effort as any marriage takes, some couples can be as opposite as the politically polarized, married political consultants Mary Matalin and James Carville and still have a great time together? Not only do Matalin’s and Carville’s political views run counter to each other, but, according to their book Love & War, Matalin has multiple beloved cats roaming around their New Orleans home, while Carville knows not their given names, choosing to refer to them as “the devil incarnate.”

On a less public stratum, countless couples face the daily challenges that come with learning to communicate about what’s important, while holding back and letting go of how to squeeze the toothpaste tube and whether the TV stays on at bedtime. Buzz residents Allyson and Michael Patronella, she a physician and he an attorney, have lots of practice merging different personalities.

Allyson grew up in a small family in Hereford, population 15,000, daughter of a farmer/rancher. Alternatively, Michael hails from Houston and is one of four brothers in a big Italian family. “They’re loud and they fight and make up the next minute,” Allyson says of her husband’s family. “In my family if we fight we won’t talk for two weeks.” Consistent with their upbringings, Allyson is the quieter of the two and describes Michael as “very boisterous and loud.” Michael adds, “I love to hear myself talk.”

“If we have a disagreement, he wants to make up immediately, and I have to let it sit for a while,” Allyson says. “But we just make it work.”

Michael credits fate – and a step out of Allyson’s character – with their meeting 28 years ago. “I was going to UT Austin, and he was at Southwestern in Georgetown, and we met at a place in Round Rock where a lot of UT and Southwestern students would go on Thursday nights,” Allyson says. Michael chimes in and says, “She was very shy but those 75-cent pitchers probably helped. [My friends and I] had been looking at her all night. She was wearing these jeans and red boots. I’ll never forget. She looked so pretty. And she came up to me at almost the last song and asked me to dance, thank God. It was so out of character for her. It was fate.” Since then, “he’s brought me out of my shell over time,” Allyson says. “I’ve become more social and I speak my mind.” Michael says that’s out of necessity: “In my family it’s kill or be killed,” he says. “If you don’t speak up someone will say something about you.”

Likewise, Allyson has tamed Michael: “She’s taught me to think before you react,” he says. “I’ve learned to hold back.” Throughout their conversations with others, including this one, Michael tells story after story, while Allyson continuously urges him to stop talking, cut back on the details and finish up.

Politically their views differ as well, but “over time, I’ve learned to appreciate his views, and I think he’s learned to appreciate mine too,” Allyson says. Michael quips, “People say we’re like James Carville and Mary Matalin, but first of all I am a lot better looking and Allyson’s a lot prettier.” And, Allyson says, “If he starts in on his political opinions, I just say stop.” Michael also thanks Allyson for encouraging him to try “green things” and wine. “She has really expanded my horizons.”

“People say all you need is love,” Michael says. “But love can only carry you so far. My love for Allyson is matched by my respect for her. She was a single mom going through college when we met, and then med school. The respect I have for her and what she’s accomplished through perseverance and hard work is unparalleled.”

In addition to respect, Michael says there’s a bottom line to why their partnership works: “Our value systems are parallel. We believe in God, family, hard work and humility. I’m boisterous, but I’m grateful. Family and faith and graciousness and respect last a lifetime.”

Rita and Jim Sowers work to keep little things little, like when Rita turns the thermostat down and Jim turns it right back up. (Photo: stpimages.com)

Rita Sowers and her management-consultant husband Jim just celebrated 40 years of marriage and concur with Michael. “We agree on what’s important,” Jim says. “Like what kind of family we wanted, how to talk through big financial decisions and that we wouldn’t make little things big issues.”

Little things being the position of the thermostats: “Rita walks around the house and lowers them. I walk behind her and raise them.” And social predilections: “Rita engages people very quickly,” Jim says. Rita counters: “I would be ready for a party in two seconds, but Jim would shower, take his vitamins and read the paper first.” And on and on: “I’m more frugal; Jim wants the best of everything. I’m a tosser; he’s a saver – he still has college books! But he’s got his own office, and his stuff is in his own room, so we just laugh about it.”

The couple, like so many others, also battled over the ages-old toilet-seat issue – whether or not to reposition the seat one way or another after using it. “We finally solved that,” Jim says. “I found a battery-powered sensor that makes the seat go down after five or 10 seconds. It was in Brookstone or an airline catalog, and the box said it would save my marriage.”

If ever anything did become a problem, Rita and Jim would be sure to head it off. “At the end of the day, Jim could lower the thermostat if it was a big issue,” Rita says. “We know our differences, and we laugh about them. You have to be able to laugh at yourself and at the other person and not get mad.”

Steve and Julie Scheinthal say their personalities differ, but their core values of family and friends are similar. Plus, he likes to take care of her, including making her omelettes. (Photo: stpimages.com)

Julie Scheinthal, married 29 years to Steve, executive vice president at Landry’s Restaurants, says, “I know that opposites attract. I tell Steve that if I’d known him growing up we wouldn’t have gone out. I think he was kind of wild as a kid, and I was a nerd.” But the two met accidentally outside a singles party, where Julie was dropping a friend, not intending to stay.

“I used to play racquetball at the JCC and had seen her there,” Steve says. “Then I think a day or two later, I was at a Hebe Hop [the aforementioned singles party], and I figured I’d go say hello. That was it.”

Julie remembers, “From the day we met, we went out every night. Three days later he cooked me dinner and said to me, ‘Julie, please don’t ever go out with anyone else.’ In three months we were engaged. There was just something I really liked about him. I loved talking to him and being with him, and I still love it.”

On being opposites, Steve says, “Some of the things that are important to me aren’t necessarily important to her, and vice versa. I want my way on certain things, and I let her have her way on certain things. The temple we belonged to wasn’t that important to me, but it was to her. Where my kids went to school was more important to her, so I let her dictate that. But it was important to me that I dictate the finances.

“I think there are more similarities. Our core values of family and friends are similar, even though there might be differences in terms of things I like or things she likes.”

Those values carry their relationship. “Steve is so wonderful to me,” Julie says. “Today [during the photo shoot for this story], we’re talking in the kitchen, and he just started making me an omelet right in the middle of everything because I had just taken my medicine and he knows I need to have food with them. He just made it, didn’t say one word about it. He thinks of me.”

Julie and Steve have faced more than their share of hard times together. They had a child die of SIDS after they had been married seven years; several months later, Julie was diagnosed with MS; and when he was 40, Steve suffered a heart attack. Through it all, the couple has remained positive.

“People always want to tell you the negative,” Julie says. “They said [challenges were] going to tear us apart, but we said no, we were not going to let that happen.” Steve says that, while they both grieved the loss of their baby, their different personalities caused them to grieve in different ways. “I had work and three other kids. For Julie it was different because she carried the baby. We handle things differently. But it’s understanding that you do what’s good for you and giving the other space to feel what they do.”

Julie adds, “You have to be happy with yourself. You know how you feel about your husband and how he feels about you. We have confidence in each other. Nothing gets in the way of that.”