Life is short, so make sure to enjoy as much as you can. The death rate for human beings hovers right around 100 percent, and is expected to remain there for … well, forever. Consider this: if the average life span is 77 years, then that means we only have 77 summers … 77 winters … 77 Christmas mornings … 77 New Years, and that’s it. It’s easy to get caught in the day-to-day craziness of life and, in the process, take our spouses for granted. A widow named Betty, married 54 years, says, “Now that he’s gone I wish I hadn’t had so many headaches.”
On Saturday, September 3, 2011 my parents celebrate 40 years of marriage. What a wonderful occasion! The ruby anniversary is a special one. Spending 40 years together is a great reason to celebrate! Their example is inspiring. Of course being one of their children, I witnessed this first-hand. They are by no means perfect, to the outside world, but to my brothers and I they are. What I mean by this is, they showed no exit strategies or desires to call it quits.
Over the years, dad learned to become the leader of the house, providing stability and security for us. Mom stood by his side and supported him. Together they became one, in all means of the word. Love and care for each other, the two way street called marriage is traveled together meeting each other’s needs.
Commitment. Something that is missed in today’s society. Committed to staying together for better or worse. As Bon Jovi sings, “lay you down in a bed of roses”, he should have included, thorns and all. There is no perfect, fairy tale life, let alone marriage. Living together for any length of time, there are bound to be annoying, irritating, and frustrating experiences. The best marriages are served with an extra helping of acceptance for one another.
So many marriages these days end in such a terrible mess. Instead of seeing boiling points through, couples are using one eye to find faults in their spouse and keeping the other open eye for an exit.
A wedding anniversary is the celebration of love, trust, partnership, tolerance and tenacity. The order varies for any given year. ~Paul Sweeney
As many of you may know, Lisa and I were married just this year, June 25, to be exact. Such a wonderful, beautiful blessing! God has truly blessed me with such a wonderful, beautiful woman. It means a lot to have someone my life that has a strong moral and christian background. She also was brought up in a family with parents committed to each other. Having lost her father, soon to be two years now, I can see how much of an influence her mother and he was in her life.
In today’s world, some people don’t understand the importance of lasting marriages. Either they don’t understand it or don’t know it. Having not being raised in an environment where there is a mother and/or father, they miss out on the things that are in God’s plan for marriage. Now I am not speaking of the ones who have lost their spouses due to circumstances of life, but to the ones that can’t seem to get past the annoyances and frustrations of living together with a spouse. Men and women alike.
Friends and co-workers on different occasions have asked me, “how is marriage life?” My answer is always, “great!”. Wait, before you say what they say when I give that response, “just wait” or “give it time”, I need to let you in on a little insight of mine. I am almost 32 years of age and never married. I have not experienced the happiness, excitement, and even frustrations of marriage. I look forward to each and every moment to experience with my bride. Sound mushy? Its not to me. Why? It comes back to watching my parents. Their example of love for each other and for us, their children is inspiring. It has to be a awesome feeling of celebrating an event that gave root to so many experiences in their lives.
I can only ask God to lead Lisa and I down a road of marriage so that we are be able to look back on the many years spent together and be able to feel such a marvelous absolution.
Evan