A Wedding Anniversary Thought

Yesterday as you read this (today, as I write it) was our 30th Wedding Anniversary. As it happens, Rosemary is in Ireland and I am in Iowa. We catch up again on Saturday in Belfast, Northern Ireland, a few days before our first grandchild is due. But all this to say, I'm in reflective mood, looking back with great joy at thirty years of almost uninterrupted bliss. So allow me to use this public forum to say something to one I love (I know she reads this page every day, and it will be fun!)

Rosemary,

Have I told you that you're the only girl I ever kissed? Yes, I know I have! Many times! Well, I've kissed a few ladies old enough to be my mother, but that's not the same! You were, and remain, the only one I wanted to marry and grow old with. But even that's not turning out as I thought since I'm the one that's growing old and you seem to get younger! Why is it that men turn ugly and women grow more beautiful? It doesn't seem quite fair to me, but since I don't look at myself too much, I think I win out on this one.

It was thirty years ago I said "I will" and "I do" and "Till death us do part". I remember every minute of it. The organist had only played about 5 bars of "Jesu Joy of Man's Desiring" and you were right there--radiant!

I never thought marriage would be so much fun! No one told me it would get better and better, but it does.

President Ronald Reagan wrote to the First Lady, on his 31st anniversary, "I told you once it was like an adolescent's dream of what a marriage should be like. That hasn't changed." I can say the same.

You make me look far better than I am.
You never stop loving our children ("fussing over them" as I often say, "like a broody hen").

The Lord has given me in you a treasure, that I in no way deserve.

As we await our first grandchild, these are the words in my heart: "Many women have done excellently, but you surpass them all" (Prov. 31:29).

PS: I'm sorry that the Braves are playing so terribly again!