For Wilshire Baptist Church
I don’t know when or how 13 got flagged as a “bad luck” number, but I disagree completely. Especially this year and this week.
As this is being posted, LeAnn and I are on a quick overnight trip to celebrate our 13th anniversary. Nothing fancy, just someplace we’ve never been with some exploring, shopping, eating, hiking and resting. It’s a rare anniversary outing for us because in previous years we’ve had a swirl of other activities crowding the date.
For several years in a row our youngest nephew stayed with us to participate in Wilshire’s MusiCamp. We have no regrets about that at all, but our fun with him usually meant we set aside our own celebration. Two years ago, my father passed away unexpectedly the day before our anniversary, and last year I was undergoing radiation every day that week and chemo on top of that.
This year we’ve been able to clear the calendar for some “we/us” time, so 13 is a lucky number for this anniversary. More than that, I feel a particular blessing to not only have found someone like LeAnn to share my life with, but to still be celebrating anniversaries after the uncertain summer of cancer.
I hadn’t thought about it quite that way until I went to one of the last remaining Hallmark shops in North Texas to look for a card. Hallmark is amazing because they have such situation-specific cards for anniversaries. They have cards for traditional couples and modern couples; couples who met in school and met on-line; childless dog-and-cat-loving couples; couples unafraid of confessional phrases like “despite our arguments and struggles”; and couples who have raised children, now have grandchildren and have much to celebrate “after all these years together.” But I’ve never seen a card that combines the feelings of a couple that has been together for just a dozen-plus years; it’s a second marriage for one and first for the other; they started out together at 50-plus years old; and they’ve faced some of the challenges that come with age.
If I could write my own card, it would tell how these 13 years have been an unexpected and unimaginable joy and blessing. It would confess that if left to our own devices, we might have never gotten started. And, it would thank Wilshire, a community that nourished us individually, provided a safe place for acquaintance to become friendship, winked and nudged us during our days of discovery, and showed up on one of the hottest July afternoons on record to help us close the deal.
Which brings us to today. As we walked to the little cottage we reserved for the night, we met a couple also celebrating their anniversary. It was their 54th, and when we told them we were on our 13th, the man laughed and declared us “newlyweds.” Yes, compared to them, that’s true, but we’re not counting the years. We’re counting the blessings.