"He was a preformed rut in my road," said Sally Field about Burt Reynolds.

In an interview on the occasion of not Reynolds's death but the publication of her memoir. Context:

I've always thought of him rather nostalgically. ... He was a very important part of my life, but for a tiny little part of my life. I was only with him for about three years and then maybe two years on-and-off after that. But it was so hugely important in my own existence, my own movement as a person.

I kind of was worried about him reading this — and now at least he's safe from that, because I think it would hurt him. It's not that I say really bad things about him, but I reveal ... what I was feeling and how trapped I was in an old pattern of behavior — and how I was predisposed. He was a preformed rut in my road.  And I couldn't see it coming and I didn't know how to get out. I had been carefully trained to fall into this. ... We were a perfect match of flaws.

"I miss her terribly. Even now, it’s hard on me. I don’t know why I was so stupid. Men are like that, you know. You find the perfect person, and then you do everything you can to screw it up."

Said Burt Reynolds.

Reynolds had wives either side of his relationship with Field; He was married to Judy Carne from 1963 to 1965, and to Loni Anderson from 1988 to 1993.... Field also had a spouse either side of the relationship; she was married to Steve Craig from 1968 to 1975; and to Alan Greisman from 1984 to 1993.

Sally Field, on hearing of the death of Burt Reynolds, said:

There are times in your life that are so indelible, they never fade away. They stay alive, even 40 years later... My years with Burt never leave my mind. He will be in my history and my heart, for as long as I live. Rest, Buddy.

He said she was the perfect person. She said she doesn't forget him, even though 40 years have passed. But who would forget a big love affair just because 40 years passed? Her statement about him is so much weaker that his about her. And she had the additional push to say good things that is his death.

I'm not going to research how they broke up. I must have followed their relationship at the time, however, because from 1973 to 1975, I workd at a market research firm where my job was reading dozens of magazines every month — including all the news magazines and women's magazines — and I must have read hundreds of articles about that love affair. But their story is not indelible in my mind. It wasn't my love affair. What were the other celebrity love affairs of those years? All I can think of is Patty Hearst and General Field Marshal Cinque.

With a little research: John and Yoko, Barbara Streisand and Elliot Gould, Jane Fonda and Donald Sutherland, Carly Simon and James Taylor, Steve McQueen and Ali MacGraw, Jack Nicholson and Anjelica Huston, Liz Taylor and Richard Burton, Farrah Fawcett and Lee Majors, Jerry Hall and Mick Jagger, Diane Keaton and Warren Beatty.

That actually does seem much grander than what we have today, at least from the perspective of someone who was in her 20s in the 1970s.

Let's go back:

Judy Carne — the English-accent counterpart to Goldie Hawn on "Laugh-In" — has died at the age of 76.

WaPo recounts "The tragic tale of Judy Carne, ‘sock-it-to-me’ girl of ‘Laugh-In'..."

"Sock it to me"... yes, it was a big thing, back in the 60s to sock a young woman — repeatedly.

The joke now seems as cruel — and as difficult to explain to millennials — as it seemed hilarious in the 1960s: A young, lithe woman, often in a miniskirt or less, stands onstage. She announces that it’s “sock-it-to-me time.” Then, she is hit with a bucket of water, or dropped through the floor, or otherwise clobbered in some form or fashion. Sure, Richard Nixon famously said the words — but he didn’t have his clothes ripped off.

Nor was he hit with anything. He subsequently won the presidency. Meanwhile, Judy Carne, unlike  Goldie Hawn, descended into a life of woe.

Between 1977 and 1978, Carne was arrested three times on charges that included drug possession and auto theft.... As Burt Reynolds became a star, Carne arguably became best known as his first wife — the pair were married from 1963 to 1966. When she faced legal trouble in the late 1970s, however, her calls to Reynolds, then on top of the world after his appearance in “Smokey and the Bandit,” were not returned. “At least he could have helped with the legal fees,” Carne said. “After all, I supported him when he was out of work, and I never asked for alimony.”...

“She was a bit of a recluse toward the end,” Jon Barrett, who confirmed her death to the New York Times, said.

“I’m a 1960s flowerchild who has refused to grow up,” she once said, as the Telegraph reported. “‘Mature’ and ‘responsible’ are words I don’t understand.”