Today Thomas and I celebrate our 24th wedding anniversary. It is hard to believe we have been married over half our lives, almost a quarter of a century.
Marriage has been both harder and more wonderful than I ever imagined - harder because I went into marriage more broken, more immature than I realized. More wonderful because Thomas' unwavering love has been a channel of joy and hope and healing deeper than I could have hoped for.
When I look back on the past 24 years, the words of Psalm 23 come to mind. "Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life." Objectively, I can remember difficult days - times when money was very tight, times when we were rehashing the same conflict for the 40th time, times when we were discouraged, times of grief. But when I look back, I am amazed at the goodness and mercy which has followed us. I can say whole-heartedly "Blessed am I among women."
Thank you, Thomas! I love you. I have no desire to go back to the days of our youth, but I am eager to run "farther up and farther in" with you.
Raising children has been a blast. Here are the first four on Father's Day at Prince Solms.
And here's the fifth child ...
Venice 2008. Photo by John Patrick, a 5 year-old view of his parents.