Rant #888: 57 and Counting

Today is my parents' anniversary. They married on this day in 1956, roughly 15 months before I was born.

I am not going into how they met and other particulars. I think I did that here before, so if you are interested, you can look it up.

Just let me tell you that I think these two were made for each other, but they are pretty much polar opposites.

Maybe that is what attracted them to each other.

My mother, who turns 82 in March, is as feisty as ever. She can seemingly never stand still, is in rapid motion just about all the time, and has more get up and go than people one-third her age.

My father, although a very hard worker, likes to take things slow. This 81 year old can just as easily drive his cab all day as he can stay in the bed all day and watch TV. 

So what you have with my parents is perpetual motion mixed with relaxation, and I really believe that is what has kept their marriage so strong for the past 57 years.

There are times they don't see eye to eye, times they are angry with each other.

But more so than not, those times are very short lived.

They not only love each other, I truly believe that they like each other too, and that has been another reason why their marriage is so strong.

They are both in their 80s, but they have remained very active over the years, and that is another secret to the success together.

They always seem to be busy, always have something to do. No time to think about negative stuff, only positives.

They are the parents of myself and my sister, and they have five grandchildren, two on my side and three on my sister's side--four boys and one girl. 

They also have my wife and my sister's husband, who they treat as their children, too.

They have seen it all in their 57 years together, but they have come a long way from their early time together, when all they had was a piece of furniture--a Dumont TV--and that was about it.

So happy anniversary to my parents. They are seemingly among the last of their kind, people who enjoy life so much that they still have much, much more to do before they leave it.

And they have so much still to do that they aren't going anywhere for a long, long, long time.