With their actions, Johnny and June Carter Cash wrote the kind of love story that people still talk about more than two decades after their deaths. Their relationship wasn't perfect, because no relationship will ever be perfect. They had their ups and downs, scandals, and suspicions. However, the love between them was strong enough to make those trials and tribulations testaments to the strength of their bond instead of poking holes in their real-life romance.

Both Johnny and June were very public about their adoration for one another. Carter penned "Ring of Fire" about her growing attraction to Cash when they were still married to other people. Cash was famously asked, in an interview, to give his definition of paradise. "This morning, with her, having coffee," Cash answered. His oft-quoted answer is proof that, despite-or maybe due to-their rough patches, their relationship is something for other couples to strive for.

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"You see, to me, the most romantic, beautiful love stories ever were the ones where two people meet, fall in love, and then fifty, sixty years later, one of them dies. Then, a few days after that, the other one dies, because they just can't bear to live without each other," Cash once wrote.

They met in 1956 and, as the story goes, fell in love almost immediately. They said "I do" on March 1, 1968. June died in May 2003, 48 years after they met, and Johnny followed her in September. So, in a way, they lived up to his ideal of the most romantic, beautiful love stories.

Johnny Cash met June Carter backstage at the Grand Ole Opry. She was singing backup for Elvis, and he was there to perform his latest hits. At the time, Carter didn't just know who he was. She was a fan. They hit it off immediately.

They began touring together in the early 1960s. At the time, Cash was still married to his first wife, and Carter was married to her second husband. Their marriages ended by the middle of the decade. He proposed to her during a concert in Canada in front of 7,000 fans in 1968, and she said yes. A few weeks later, they tied the knot,

While no marriage can be truly said to be "happily ever after," the two were married for the rest of their lives. So, it seems as though they got as close as two people can to a storybook ending.