Married 69 years, Santa Rosa couple separated by COVID-19

Through the moves and job changes, the children and grandchildren and great-children, there has always been one constant for Ramund Martignoli: his wife, Rose Marie. They have been married for 68¾ years, as Ray likes to say, and have been a couple for well over 70.

The Martignolis currently live at Arbol Residences, a continuing care retirement community in Santa Rosa’s Fountaingrove district. But they do not live together. Ray, who describes himself as “probably the most active resident here,” is on the third floor, in one of the assisted living apartments. Rose Marie, who is sliding into Alzheimer’s dementia, is on the first floor, in memory care.

That spatial separation wasn’t traumatic before the spread of a new coronavirus ripped holes in the lives of elderly Americans. Even in the early stages of the pandemic, the Martignolis could eat together, stroll together, spend most of their days hand in hand. Then staff members at Arbol began to test positive for the virus.

Ray Martignoli said there were five cases. Mariele Soriano, Arbol’s executive director, declined to confirm the number but said the first positive test result landed Aug. 8, the most recent on Sept. 8.

In any case, Soriano and her staff quickly moved to protect their 92 residents by isolating the various sections of the facility, which also includes a skilled nursing unit. Ray and Rose Marie went five months with no physical contact. And now, with fears of a deadly outbreak still guiding staff decisions, the soon-to-be 89-year-olds are allowed to meet for only 30 minutes a day.

“For them to be apart, living in the same building, must be extremely difficult for my father,” said Terri Martignoli, at 65 the eldest of the couple’s four children. “He’s the one who always had everything under control and organized. He’s always taken care of it.”

If the pandemic has taught anything, it’s that very little is truly under control, especially for the elderly. Their lives are now largely structured not around what brings them joy, but what keeps them safe. And as the Martignolis’ story demonstrates, balancing physical and mental health can be a no-win situation for the people charged with making those decisions.

Ramund Martignoli and Rose Marie Shelly were kids when they met. He was a freshman at San Rafael High School, she was a sophomore, though they were the same age.

“She’s 12 days older than I,” Ray noted. “I always claim I married an older woman.”

They were dating by the time Rose Marie was a senior, but it didn’t last long. “She broke up on April Fools’ Day,” Ray said, “and I thought it was a joke.”

You could say they patched things up. The couple reacquainted after high school, fell in love and were married Feb. 10, 1952.

By 1964, they had moved to Santa Rosa, to a house near Chanate Road. Ray worked at San Quentin State Prison for 26 years, then transferred to Folsom the final six years of his career. He worked in prison industries, helping to oversee the inmates who made furniture, apparel and detergents for others in the California prison system, and stamped license plates for those on the outside.

Rose Marie supported his career at every step, managing things at home so he could take night classes and advance to a management position. She took on most of the child rearing, worked part-time jobs at five-and-dime stores and logged heavy hours volunteering at St. Rose Church.

Ray retired at 55 with a nice pension. The family expanded. Eight grandchildren. Nine great-grandchildren. Along the way, Ray and Rose Marie developed the sort of effortless connection that comes with decades of quiet proximity.

“We’ve been together so long, we just look at each other and know what the hell’s going on without saying anything,” Ray said.

Alzheimer’s hasn’t destroyed that bond, but it certainly has changed the nature of the relationship. Ray Martignoli said he had been Rose Marie’s primary caregiver for about four years before they moved into Arbol in 2019 after Ray was hit with a one-two punch — a still-undiagnosed illness followed by a stroke — that temporarily laid him low.

Rose Marie, by all accounts, is sociable and cheerful in memory care. Ray Martignoli said she retains a sharp recall of long-ago events, but has trouble forming new memories.

“She’ll read the papers to me in the morning,” he explained. “She just sits there and reads the same caption, and we’ll read it again. She’s going through the typical dementia, she’ll ask where her parents are and stuff like that. That becomes another stress situation.”

One that increases anxiety for both of them, according to Ray, is when he and his wife are separated. So he has pushed back against the rules prohibiting them from spending more time together.

Before the positive coronavirus tests at Arbol, Ray Martignoli was a bridge-builder there. He was part of the facility’s executive council, “like an ambassador for residents,” he said. He ran the meetings and kept the minutes. He helped organize Sunday church groups, and arranged for a Eucharistic minister to visit Arbol and deliver the host.

“I’m kind of a go-getter, a people person,” Ray said. “I spend the afternoon sometimes drinking a little too much, but that’s OK.”

Fine Italian wine? “Two Buck Chuck,” he said with a laugh.

When Soriano told him he could see Rose Marie for only a half-hour a day, Ray became a rebel. He resigned his position on the council and began to approach his life at Arbol as if he were an enterprising prisoner of war. He cased his wife’s movements throughout the day — exercise from 10 to 10:30 a.m., group trivia from 10:30-11, then lunch, then bingo — and looked for chances to steal time with her. There is an electronic lock on the door to the memory care unit at Arbol, with a numerical keypad. Ray cracks the code each time they change it, and lets himself in.

His frustration only grew when Arbol began allowing a beautician to visit rooms recently. She follows precautions, but as Ray points out, it’s hard to fix a resident’s hair without touching her mask.

“It’s a helpful hand, where mine would be a compassionate hand,” he said. “And I don’t see the difference.”

Soriano empathizes with Ray Martignoli’s longings. But she is determined to use an abundance of caution if it means avoiding the sort of viral spread that has devastated other senior homes in Sonoma County.

“Visitations for all residents — including Ray and Rose Marie — are supported by the help of our staff,” the executive director wrote in an email. “They ensure the resident is bathed and dressed and ready for their visitation. Additionally, the staff are with the residents during their visit to support them.”

Soriano said she has one overarching goal: “The health and safety of all our employees and residents of Arbol remains our highest priority.”

As of Tuesday, at least 105 of the 134 known COVID fatalities in Sonoma County have occurred at skilled nursing homes or residential care facilities. As of Oct. 11, according to a database managed by the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services, Arbol had not recorded a single confirmed or suspected case of coronavirus among residents, let alone a death.

Even Ray is quick to acknowledge the home’s stellar safety record. In fact, it was he who composed a thank you letter to staff in August and took it around for other residents to sign.

Everyone on site at Arbol must wear a mask unless eating. Front desk workers take the temperature of each staff member and visitor as they arrive. Large social gatherings and recreational activities have been canceled. The campus abounds with sanitizing stations.

Soriano and her staff have looked to national, state and county health officials for guidance, but the rules aren’t always clear. The California Department of Public Health OK’d visits to long-term care facilities, contingent upon a long list of safety protocols, on Aug. 25. Sonoma County Health Officer Dr. Sundari Mase, noting the county’s relentlessly high infection rates, has approved visits, but only outdoors.

When it comes to the mixing of residents in different levels of care, the county takes a fairly hands-off approach.

“It’s up to the facilities to ensure that they are enforcing the best practices,” Mase said, cautioning that she could not speak to a specific case as the Martignolis’. “That would include social physical distancing, the facial coverings and the general hygiene measures. The facility should be the one to interpret very specific recommendations.”

Even Terri Martignoli is torn on her father’s campaign to be exempted from the rules. Terri’s career was in food service and hospitality. She trained workers in ServSafe certification, and understands how problematic it can be for a site to bend safety policy in individual cases.

At the same time, Terri Martignoli can’t help but see how damaging this separation has been to both of her parents.

“She does forget a lot of things, with having Alzheimer’s dementia. But she doesn’t forget him,” Terri said. “She’s been in his life for more than 70 years. I think it’s just the calmness and peace of knowing he’s there when she goes to bed at night. And for him, just to know she’s being taken care of the way he would do it. He has something about contact and personal touch that makes him know everything’s OK.”

Ray Martignoli admits his drive to see Rose Marie at any cost is largely for his own comfort. But he insists his wife gets something important from their contact, too.

“She just seems to relax more when I give her a little hug or little peck before I go,” Ray said. “Now I do it and I feel guilty, because I’m not supposed to be doing it.”

You can reach Phil Barber at 707-521-5263 or phil.barber@pressdemocrat.com. On Twitter @Skinny_Post.