This week, on the 28th, we will celebrate our 25th Wedding Anniversary.  We’ll celebrate by spending the week in a perfectly lovely tropical paradise.  It will be the first time since our honeymoon that we have been away together-alone- for a full week!!! Wish us luck. (haha) We are going to celebrate 25 years of wonderful memories and we will be celebrating the bad times, the sickness and the poorer,  because, let’s face it, marriage is easy for better, in health, and for richer!! We’ve seen our share (more in some spots) of the bad, the sickness, and the poorer and here we still are 25 years later! I like to think that our marriage has been tested in the fire of these times, and like a good metal, we have come out of the flames, stronger and more beautiful than we went in.  My daughter (one of the two best things about our union, the other being her brother) said to me today “Mom, this is a monumental achievement, like earning your degree” and I replied ” It’s really more like getting your PhD!!”  It really does feel quite large as far as occasions go.

On the night before our wedding, as we were about to go our separate ways for the night I whispered to my soon to be husband” I can’t wait until it’s just the two of us” and he said ” It will never be just the two of us, because tomorrow when we take our vows, God will be there as witness to them, and He will be with us every step of our lives”  I remember feeling the weight of that statement, it made the day ahead that much more important to me.  And, clearly, I’ve never forgotten those words.  Mark was right, God has been with us through it all – Good, Bad, Sickness, Health, Richer, Poorer. In our joys, making them all the more joyful, and in our sorrows, keeping us going and keeping us together.

Happy Anniversary, here’s to 25 more!!