Love, The Glenn Home

I do realize that I am behind on this particular post. And this post is kind of long. But I am at least posting.

On June 25, 2012 Lisa and I celebrated our first full year of being married! It has been a wonderful year! Bringing our two lives together and learning to live as one is beautiful, awe-inspiring and life changing. She is still and will always be the beautiful bride that I first saw coming through the back door of the church and walking down that long, long isle. I remember trying hard to control myself and not run down to pick her up and carry her myself back up to where the minister and wedding party were standing. And I still need to control myself every day that I leave from work and not speed home, like a race car driver headed to the finish line on the last lap, to see her. I know, I know what some of you are thinking, still in the “honeymoon” phase. It will change. But the reality of it is, it has changed!

According to tradition, the first year anniversary is also when the couple is supposed to pull the top-tier of their wedding cake out of the freezer and eat it, although not all couples indulge

in this practice. Our cake top was wrapped up and sealed up tight and had many layers of cellophane and aluminum foil and then put into a freezer bag. When we opened it up on the night of our one year anniversary it still had its beautiful appearance and shape nothing was out-of-place nor lost is brilliant colors. Let me just say, that a one year old frozen cake with fondant icing tastes gross! And I like me some cake. However, we indulged in this tradition with happiness because if that cake had made it stored in a freezer for one year untouched it deserved to be eaten, at least some of it.

One-year wedding anniversaries are particularly special for many reasons. Couples are still considered newlyweds when this anniversary rolls around and this is the first anniversary that couples can celebrate as a married couple. Completing the first year of marriage is definitely cause for celebration. As I just mentioned above, things have changed. But for the better! In the last post 40 More Years, Please. , I stated that, I had not been married before, nor have I experienced the happiness, excitement, and even frustrations of marriage. I look forward to each and every moment to experience with my bride. And continuing that wonderful thought, I am looking forward to many, many years of excitement, frustrations and happiness. The first wedding anniversary is a significant event because it celebrates the fact that the couple is still together after the first year of adjustments to married life. Reaching the first wedding anniversary means that the married couple has weathered the adjustments to married life so far. The benefit to celebrating this event is the recognition of a couple’s love as well as their resolve to stay together as a married couple.

We have resolved! We have resolved to adorn each other with devotion of love to each other. That cake did look good when we first opened it up. I remember how it tasted, the little bite of it she shoved all over my face. It was yummy! And so I was anxious to try it. As we started to cut it and it began to melt and all of that icing became a gooey mess and the cake inside had lost its fluffiness. It was awful and sad. But cakes that are made for eating do not last forever. No matter how well you wrap them up and seal them up.

So why have I gone on and on about that cake? To me it is a symbol of a couple of things.

First. It bothers me that I hear married couples with years of experience behind them speak about how things change in a negative way. Why are you showing the younger, inexperienced generation an unenthusiastic view of such a beautiful union. The union that God created! The husband is a blessing for the wife and the wife is a blessing for the husband. A gift from the Creator to each of you. How do you think He wants you to show others His work? With happiness and willingness and an attitude of love!

Second, Are they the ones that have left their cake in the freezer and get it out for special occasions expecting it to be just as fresh and delightful as the day they first tasted it? We are to enjoy the cake. We are supposed to share the cake with each other. By feeding each other unconditional love and be willing to sacrifice selfishness to make the other happy. The cake will never run out as long as God is making the cake in your marriage. Just as Christ made more wine for the wedding he will make more cake for you. Notice that I did not say another cake will be made, I said more cake will be made. And each time that you taste it, it will be more fulfilling and more sweeter.

I pray that Lisa and I continue to have our cake and eat it too, every day! And some days we may even have some ice cream with it!

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