40th Anniversary…what's the secret to reaching it?

While celebrating the mass in honour of my parents, my uncle spoke at length about commitment and how difficult it is to remain constant in our commitment to each other over long periods of time. How the ups and downs of everyday life can sometimes cause our commitment to waiver. He talked about the importance of fidelity and faithfulness and he talked about honesty in its varying forms. (I asked him later what he meant by “varying forms” and he said, “Sometime NOT telling something can be as hurtful as telling a lie and being brutally honest can also be hurtful…we should temper what we say with kindness and sensitivity”).

Then my uncle led my parents to renew their wedding vows. It was short, sweet and very touching. Forty years after they first spoke the words, they promised to love, honour and cherish each other lawfully - again - for as long as they both shall live. As their child it was a truly proud and wonderful moment to witness.

Later when the wine glasses were full, I made a brief speech about some of the elements that went into their 40 years together, but not before I polled the guests as to what their opinions were on the subject. The guests, some of whom have been married longer than 40 years, called out their answers: Love! Sense of humour! Patience! Learn to say “Yes Dear”! Commitment!

It is true that lot goes into building, creating, surviving a forty year marriage. I broke it down into some statistics for those of us hoping to make to that anniversary:

After 40 years together you will have been married

• 21,024,000 minutes
• 350,400 hours
• 14,600 days

After 40 years together you will have shared

• approx 43,500 meals together
• around 10,000 pots of afternoon tea (of coffee, if that's your thing)
• and around 900 trays of muffins (at least in my family that was the case)

Specifically related to my parents and family, after 40 years together:

• There have been 250 birthdays (200 of which have included discussions on who made the cake)
• There have been about 300 dinner parties (well, 299 actually because nobody came to that first party up in Yellowknife)
• There have been 75 trips to the hospital, 4 for Mom when Dave Steve Geoff and I were born, 5 trips for the grandchildren and the remaining 64 were for Dad…most recently on Friday with a series of nasty wasp stings! Bless him, he is rather accident prone!)
• There have been 40 Easters, 40 Thanksgivings, and 40 Christmas’ most of them spent around a huge table of family and friends with exceptional food, of course…
• There have been 8 cars
• 6 houses (and no doubt mountains of debt that have be climbed and descended)
• 3 retirements
• I Bed and Breakfast run
• 1 trip to India
• 35 trips to Tofino
• 38 successful gardens (to one degree or another). I could go on, but I won't.
  

These mentioned above are all countable components to building a 40 year marriage, but of course there and many uncountable elements as well. These are some of the immeasureables:

• The number of hugs and kisses
• The number of late night worry sessions
• The number of times they have fought and made up
• The number of belly laughs
• The number of tears
• The number of prayers asked and answered

All of this, and more I suppose, goes into building a 40 year marriage. I say "building" because there is no way around it, to be successful marriage it takes at least some work. My parents have been an example to me for their humour, their kindness and their commitment to each other, to their family and to their friends.

To those of you reading this I wish you every happiness in your marriage or your partnership as you work toward YOUR 40^th anniversary.

Happy Couples, Happy Planet!

posted by Heather and Dan @ 7:09 AM