51 years and still counting

A page out of our first photograph album

We were married fifty-one years ago yesterday.  We had a long weekend for a honeymoon and went to Bear Lake.  See the Sterling Motel?  It was six dollars a night.

Obviously, I was not a seven cow wife.

It rained.  We went home early and painted our apartment, (married-student housing at the University of Utah for $42.00 a month).  When the wind blew hard out of the mountains, our drapes would blow into the living room, even though the windows were shut.

Tom was shocked when I drew naked ladies on the wall of the bathroom.

"Something for you to look at when you pee," I said.

Tom used the bedroom as his study and we slept on a hideabed.  We slept on a hideabed for four years, actually. 

My favorite decade?  When I was in my forties.  My ankle went south at 50 and suddenly I was a whole different person: an uncoordinated person.  That was new.  Four operations on the ankle and one operation on a lung.  Fun.

He had a pituitary tumor removed in his early fifties.

Now we sit on our porch on summer evenings and say, "Soon we'll, be dead."  And then, "It was fun wasn't it?"

It was more than fun. It was rich.