Today is our wedding anniversary: 1969 – 2010. Our forty-first anniversary by the way most people count–82 years of marriage by our count. WE have been married 82 years–41 for me and 41 for Jan. There’s a story behind this story.
We were married on August 15 and thought little about the date we had chosen until Valentine’s Day rolled around the following year. Six months. Six months for me, six months for her. We got out the top of our wedding cake and celebrated one year of marriage. No problem until August–now what to do? We celebrated two years of marriage. And thus have we gone forward now for 41 years and 82 celebrations. (We have to be careful how we say it and how we respond to questions.)
Someone says, “Well, if you’re going to count that way….” We respond, “You only get to count that way if you started that way–we’ve celebrated another year 82 times!”
This year I get to preach on our anniversary. Someone said, “You have to work on your anniversary.” I said, “That’s a good thing.” Jan and I are not the only ones noticing this year. The church is going all out for this one–special luncheon at Red Lobster with a group of Christian friends, cake and ice cream reception this evening after worship. Lots of greetings and well-wishers.
We have many special memories among our 82 celebrations–it is amazing how many of them we remember. (It is also amazing how many of them we do not remember.) This will be one of the special ones–#82. Thanks to our spiritual family at Holmes Road that helped to make this day a special memory!