Michael Garofalo (MG): Hey there, podcast listeners. Michael Garofalo here for StoryCorps and I’ve got some news.

We’ve been doing this podcast since 2007 — yes, there were podcasts in 2007. In fact, at the time we thought we were late to the game. There was one guy who wrote to us almost every week — or at least it seemed that way — asking when we were going to start podcasting.

So we did. And if any of you out there have been listening since, then you might remember that for a long time our podcast feed just featured the story that we had broadcast on NPR that week.

Then a few years ago we started doing things the way you hear them now — not only do you get a great StoryCorps conversation, but you learn more about the people who made the recording. You get conversations with StoryCorps producers, who take you behind the scenes, and other people who make the organizations go. And you get to come along as we dive into our archive — the largest single collection of human voices ever gathered — and curate stories around a theme.

Well, it’s time for us to make another change — and we think you’re going to love it. Starting this fall,  we’re going to bring you this podcast in seasons of 12 episodes each. They’ll be organized around a single topic, idea, or theme and we hope we can go even deeper so far on these stories that you love.

In order to do that, we’re going to take a little break from our weekly show. After this episode, our feed is going to go dark until the fall as we retool and produce our first season.

But StoryCorps has plenty happening until then that you should check out. Follow us on social media — Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, wherever you are — and keep an eye out for a whole new season of our Emmy winning animations which is coming up later this summer, as well as the launch of One Small Step, our new project that aims to bring people together across political divides to have StoryCorps conversations and get to see the other side as full human beings.

Of course, our team is still turning out incredible poetic stories that showcase hope, courage, and the true soul of who we are each Friday morning on NPR’s Morning Edition.

So stay subscribed, stay tuned, and watch for a new and improved StoryCorps podcast come this fall.

But before I go, I thought we’d close out this run of podcasts with the story we started back in episode 1.

It’s a StoryCorps classic — and it’s truly a story that reminds you what’s really important in life.

It comes from horse-betting clerk Danny Perasa and his wife Annie from Brooklyn New York. They first came to StoryCorps in 2004 to talk about their very first date.

Danny Perasa (DP): She started to talk, and I said listen I’m going to deliver a speech and I said at the end you’re gonna want to go home. I said you represent a dirty four letter word, I said that word is love. I says if we’re going anywhere we’re going down the aisle because I’m too tired, too sick and too sore to do any other damn thing. And she turned around and she said, of course I’ll marry you. And the next morning I called her as early as I possibly could –

Annie Perasa (AP): And he always gets up early – (laughs)

DP: – to make sure she hadn’t changed her mind, and she hadn’t. And every year on April 22 around three o’clock, I call her and ask her if it was today would she do it again, and so far the answer’s been the same.

AP: Yeah, twenty-five times yes. (laughs)

DP: You see, the thing of it is, I always feel guilty when I say I love you, to you, and I say it so often, I say it to remind you that as dumpy as I am, it’s coming from me- it’s like hearing a beautiful song from a busted old radio. And it’s nice of you to keep the radio around the house.

AP: If I don’t have a note on the kitchen table, I think there’s something wrong. You write a love letter to me every morning.

DP: The only thing that could possibly be wrong is that I couldn’t find a silly pen.

AP: To my princess, the weather out today is extremely rainy, I’ll call you at eleven twenty in the morning –

DP: It’s a romantic weather report.

AP: -And I love you, I love you, I love you.

DP: When a guy is happily married, no matter what happens at work, no matter what happens in the rest of the day, there’s a shelter when you get home, there’s a knowledge, knowing that you can hug somebody without them throwing you down the stairs and saying get your hands off me. Being married is like having a color television set, you never want to go back to black and white.

[MUSIC]

MG: We first broadcast that story on Valentine’s Day in 2004. After that, we stayed in really close touch with Danny and Annie. In fact, Danny did a bunch of interviews. He came back with Annie, he interviewed baseball umpires and cops that he knew. Anyone that he can get into the booth. He’d even call us here at StoryCorps once a week, and ask if there was anything we needed him to talk about. In fact, once he called and said, ”Hey, I had cataract surgery this week. Do you need me to come in and talk about it?” Danny and Annie really became part of the family here at StoryCorps. So, in 2006, when we got the news that Danny had been diagnosed with a fast-spreading terminal cancer, it hit us pretty hard. Danny wanted to do one more interview with Annie, but he was too sick to come to the booth. So we went to their house in Brooklyn and we recorded what you’re going to hear next. Danny was lying on a couch, Annie was sitting in a chair next to him.

AP: The illness is not hard on me; it’s just, you know, the finality of it–and him, he goes along like a trooper.

DP: Listen, even downhill a car doesn’t roll unless it’s pushed and you’re giving me a great push. The deal of it is, we try to give each other hope and not hope that I’ll live, hope that she’ll do well after I pass, hope that people will support her, hope that if she meets somebody and likes ’em, she marries ’em.

AP: Yeah, he has everything planned, you know.

DP: I’m working on it. She said it was her call. She wants to walk out behind the casket alone. I guess that’s the way to do it because when we were married, you know how your brother takes you down, your father takes you down? She said, well, I don’t know which of my brothers to walk in with, I don’t want to offend anybody. I says I got a solution, I said you walk in with me, you walk out with me and the other day I said who’s gonna walk down the aisle with you behind the casket, you know, to support her and she said nobody; I walked in with you alone. I’m walking out with you alone.

AP: Mm hmm.

DP: There’s a thing in life where you have to come to terms with dying. Well, I haven’t come to terms with dying yet. I want to come to terms with being sure that you understand that my love for you up to this point was as much as it could be and it’ll be as much as it could be for eternity. I always said the only thing I have to give you was a poor gift and it’s myself, and I always gave it, and if there’s a way to come back and give it, I’ll do that too. Do you have the Valentine’s Day letter there?

AP: Yeah. (AP Reads Note) AP: My dearest wife, this is a very special day. It is a day on which we share our love which still grows after all these years. Now that love is being used by us to sustain us through these hard times. All my love, all my days and more. Happy Valentine’s Day.

DP: (Crying) I could write on and on about her. She lights up the room in the morning when she tells me to put both hands on her shoulders so that she can support me. She lights up my life when she says to me at night, wouldn’t you like a little ice cream or would you please drink more water. I mean, those aren’t very romantic things to say, but they stir my heart. In my mind and my heart there has never been, there is not now and never will be another Annie.

[MUSIC]

MG: We recorded that conversation, which ended up being Danny and Annie’s final StoryCorps interview, in February of 2006. We recorded it on a Thursday, broadcast it the next Friday, and the very same day, Danny died. Since then, one of the most common questions we get here at StoryCorps is, ”Whatever happened to Annie?” Well, I’ll let her tell you.

AP: I know that people have written to StoryCorps asking if I was still alive. No, I’m still alive and I live with the philosophy that Danny and I always had, it was: Never Say Goodbye. This year would’ve been our 35th wedding anniversary. And I miss my letters from Danny, I do. But after Danny died, I had received thirteen hundred letters of condolences. I mean, I got letters as far away as Beijing, China, you know? Or Paris, France — ’My English is not too well please excuse me, I wish to send my condolences.’ So I would read one a day because Danny wrote me a love letter every day. You know, like people say, ”You must miss Danny terribly.” No. It was an honor to be married to him. So it’s not terrible that I had the time to be with him. You know, life is too short. You come and you’re gone. But Danny didn’t go. He’s not gone because of StoryCorps.

[MUSIC]

MG: That’s Annie Perasa.

And that’s all for now. Stay subscribed and we’ll see you in the fall. For the StoryCorps podcast, I’m Michael Garofalo. Thanks for listening.