Celebrating Marriage

Attribution

This weekend found us on the road again!  But for happier reasons this trip.

Heading the car toward Seattle, we traveled to celebrate with my husband's older sister and her husband their 60 years of marriage.

As their generation grows older and passes on, it is not likely that we'll see so many long-lived marriages.  Divorces, living together rather than marrying, and other current social trends may cause 60-year marriages to come into decline.

During our celebration, the pastor at the church where the celebratory couple attends spoke for a moment.  Yes, he reminded us of the verses found in Genesis that speak to the state of marriage.

He went on to point out that this marriage of 60 years exemplifies for all of us who come behind what marriage should be.  Despite ordinary tough times and medical crises along the way, this couple has remained as one, joined together as God would have them be.

In so many ways, my sister- and brother-in-law have been good examples for all who have come behind them.  But in this one, they are standouts!

For this reason a man will leave his father and his mother,
and will be joined to his wife. And they will become one flesh.
Genesis 2:24 (NLV)

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Today is Monday so time for Multitudes on Mondays at A Holy Experience and for giving thanks for God's many gifts over the past week.  Ann Voskamp is traveling in Haiti with her son this week on behalf of Compassion International.  Whether or not Ann puts up the usual link for Mondays, I'm counting anyway!


<sup>560.  For the gift of our sister- and brother-in-law's example in marriage.
561.  Seeing family from all across the country this weekend.
562.  Once again safe travel.
563.  Joy of seeing generation to generation engaging with one another.
564.  The long-awaited arrival of summer in the Pacific NW!
565.  Blooming hydrangeas.
566.  Sitting outdoors and breathing in the fresh air.
567.  Picking blueberries from my bushes.
568.  Picking our first marionberry this morning.
569.  Looking into the eyes of my husband and giving thanks for 30 years together.
570.  Healing for our grandson.
571.  Our daughters-in-law who bring us great joy.
572.  Being at home for awhile.

Have you started counting your one thousand gifts or more?  Come on over to A Holy Experience and join the community!</sup>





 

Journey of a Lifetime - Installment 4

Nelle struggled on through life doing her best at the jobs she could find.  She was a hard worker and through her mother's training, she was a young woman with morals and values.  The family attended church every Sunday and the Bible was a focal point of reading at home.

Unfortunately, nearing 19 years of age, Nelle met a handsome young man named Joseph Whitehead.  At about the same time, her younger sister began dating Joe's brother.  It wasn't long until the two couples married.  And within a year Nelle and Joe had a son, Joseph Eugene Whitehead.  The marriage was not to be long-lived as Joe was an alcoholic and found it entertaining to batter those whom he proclaimed he loved.

The divorce was final in the mid 1930s, during difficult years for the country and the city of Nashville.  Nelle struggled once again to find work.  A variety of jobs came her way.  When the young men began to go away to war, she landed a job with AVCO working as a Rosie the Riveter on airplane parts.  She definitely did her part in the war effort!  However, that job ended when the boys began to come home and needed their jobs back, and once again Nelle found herself raising a young son and without work.

Luckily for me, Nelle found work at Foster & Parks in Nashville working as a devil for the typesetter who would become my father.  A “devil” in the printing industry is someone hired to tear down the type which had been set to print something, and then to melt that metal down so that it could be reused.  When her older brother learned about her new job, he told her to stay away from "that typesetter called Country Adams.  He's nothing but trouble."  Obviously, Nelle didn't pay much attention to her brother’s comments, doing everything Country asked her to do, especially when he told her if she could bring him back a pack of Luckies, he'd take her to the movies.  She did everything she could to secure that date, and came back with the Luckies and a smile on her face.

A promised date took them to the movies and out afterwards for a little clubbing.  Country unfortunately had a bad habit with drink, and he became drunk.  Nelle had strong feelings about alcohol and drunkenness and told him that if he wanted to see her again or have any part in her life, he'd have to clean up his act.  It must have been true love for Country stopped drinking, and they married in 1945.  They agreed not to add to the three children they had between them, but God intervened and I was born in February of 1946.  Nelle’s son, Gene (or Bubba to me), was 14 and quickly became my hero.

Country’s two daughters, Virginia and Elsie, were young women already married when my parents married.  They each had children born not long after my birth.  It wasn’t clear to me why at the time but Virginia and Elsie didn’t visit us much.  As I grew older, it became quite clear that they too had struggles with mama.

Between 1946 and 1954, Nelle suffered through four pregnancies, all of which ended in miscarriages.  The reasons for these losses isn’t known to me, but I do know that she didn’t smile much during this time.  Finally in November 1954 my young brother, Brad, was born.  Brad cried and fussed a lot due to enlarged tonsils and adenoids preventing him from sleeping well.  However, there was nothing to be done at such a young age.  The lack of sleep took its toll on our parents. 

I certainly didn’t like the idea of having a baby brother, and I made my feelings clear by carving with a ballpoint pen in a mahogany nightstand.  My parents were constantly telling me when Brad did fall asleep:  “Now, be quiet. The baby is sleeping.”  I soon began to tire of this repeated instruction, so I chose my words carefully and went about creating my art.  Neatly carved in that nightstand, until this day, are the words “Shhhhhh, baby is sleeping.”

No one seemed to understand the why behind my creation, nor did anyone take the time to ask me to explain.  I felt left out, and at eight years of age the last thing I wanted around was a baby.  Instead, I was punished, which I believe I deserved.  It was after all an effort on my part to get their attention to express my needs, and I chose a very poor medium to deliver my message.

Brad’s arrival seemed to round out the family as my parents wanted it.  Country was so proud exclaiming to all who would listen:  “God has blessed me like he did Abraham with a son in my old age.  He was 53 when Brad was born, and Nelle was 42.  At their ages, a fretful and crying baby was indeed tough for them.  Having an eight-year old carving up the furniture wasn’t helpful, and so they decided that there would be no more additions to the Adams household.

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I choose not to address anyone else's relationship with Nelle, or as I'll call her from now on, Mama, as I don't feel it is fair to delve into areas where I can't confirm facts.  What I do know about my life, and what I witnessed in my younger brother's can be confirmed, and I share it willingly because it ties into the end of our journey and brings power and beauty to the finished story.

And thus begins the story of my life with Mama.

30 Years!

I opened my eyes this morning and as I turned to see my husband lying beside me, I couldn't believe that it had been 30 years ago today that God brought us into this relationship called marriage.  Bob is the greatest gift God has given me in that 30 years, and I still treasure him as much or more today than I did on August 15, 1981.

Bob and I had traveled rocky roads in previous marriages.  We agreed to be married after dating and knowing each other for a rather brief period of four months.  You see we knew God was in the formula, and that with  Him in the formula we couldn't go wrong.  This isn't to say that life has always been easy because it hasn't.  We blended two families on weekends and during summers.  Job changes resulted in our moving from Tennessee to the Pacific Northwest where Bob found work and had family.  This meant leaving my family and friends of a lifetime in Tennessee.  However, as my story unfolds, I didn't find this too difficult as it meant another chance at living life to the fullest and in happiness.

Now that we've celebrated this day we're laughing and thinking, "What if?"  What if we make it another 20 years will the kids throw us a 50th anniversary celebration (mumblings were heard that we'd be 94 and 85 by then)?  Our 40-year old son called today to wish us a happy anniversary and ended the conversation with, "I'd better let you go so you can get started on that next 30!  Do you realize Bob will be 104 and you'll be . . .?"  I filled in the blank with 95, and he gasped!  Sad but true.

Life is filled with good memories like these and yet I need to purge some memories that weren't so good before I married Bob and God became a bigger force in my life.  Please stay tuned!