Sweet Sixteen

Marriage has certain qualities of contract, in which two people take on the housekeeping tasks of living, together, to enhance life's joy.  However, marriage is more than a contract.  Marriage is commitment to take that joy deep, deeper than happiness, deep into the discovery of who you most truly are.  It is a commitment to a spiritual journey, to a life of becoming—in which joy can comprehend despair, running through rivers of pain into joy again. And thus marriage is even deeper than commitment.  It is a covenant—a covenant that says: I love you. I trust you. I will be there for you when you are hurting. And when I am hurting, I will not leave. It is a covenant, not to provide haven from pain or from anger and sorrow.  Life offers no such haven.  Instead, marriage is intended to provide a sanctuary safe enough to risk loving, to risk living and sharing from the center of oneself.  This is worth everything. (Margaret A. Keip)

It is certainly true that every man ought to love and cherish his wife, and every woman should love and cherish her husband: for he is her beginning. (A merchant of Paris “On Love and Marriage” c. 1393)

Marriage is somewhat like undertaking a Lego project without instructions. (Ammunni Bala Subramanian)

Marriage is like a 5,000-piece jigsaw puzzle--all sky. (Cathy Ladman)

One advantage of marriage, it seems to me, is that when you fall out of love with him, or he falls out of love with you, it keeps you together until you maybe fall in love again. (Judith Viorst)

Marriage resembles a pair of shears, so joined that they cannot be separated, often moving in opposite directions, yet always punishing anyone who comes between them. (Sydney Smith)

A great marriage is not when the "perfect couple" comes together. It is when an imperfect couple learns to enjoy their differences. (Dave Meurer)

Happy 16th anniversary to my soul mate. I love you, Dan! You make me a better person and I still can’t believe that I get to be your wife.