Thirteen Years

Today we celebrate our 13th anniversary.  It seems like yesterday that we stood with our family and friends in a little courthouse in San Angelo, Texas and exchanged our vows.  MANY people told each of us that we wouldn't make it.  Well, dagnabbit, they're wrong!  We are stronger now than ever.

In honor of the occasion, I thought I would write thirteen things I've learned over the past years of being married.  In no particular order of importance.  Here we go.

1.  Love the man you married.  Not the one you thought you married, or the one you thought you could change him into.  He's the way he is, the way God created him, and that's it.  And it's great.

2.  Marriage is work.  Plain and simple.  You work it, every day, so that it pays in dividends.

3.  Couples will never agree on everything, all the time.  But that doesn't mean you fight about it.  You just agree to disagree.  And move on.  As a friend said the other day, "Round down range."

4.  He will continue to leave the dirty peanut butter knife on the counter by the sink unless you mention how annoying it is.  Then, he gets it.  Husbands aren't psychic.

5.  I sometimes wish husbands WERE psychic.  It would save a lot of hinting around, and then realizing that I just have to say it and get it over with.

6.  Don't have kids to build a marriage or make it better.  You bring them into a marriage, fold them into the family.  And if the core, the marriage, isn't strong, the family falls apart.

7.  A family will fall apart if it's not focused on God at its center.

8.  Love the little quirks ... how he "chews rocks" every night in his sleep, how he needs to run a few miles every day or else, how he kisses you good night.

9.  Tell him how much you appreciate what a great husband and father he is.

10.  A husband in an apron at the kitchen sink is a very sexy thing to behold.

11.  A husband that washes and dries the laundry so I don't have to go down to the basement is an incredibly sexy thing to behold.

12.  He will sometimes be in a bad mood, and that's okay.  He's human.  We all are.

13.  The husband that truly puts God first will love his wife with all his heart, all his soul and all his mind, and never take his vows lightly.

There are a myriad more numbers, more lessons that I've learned over the years.  I pray that I will always have something to write, a lesson to learn.

Happy Anniversary, my love.