June 9, 1967

What do you call an anniversary, if what it commemorates no longer exists?  I sometimes say (when I think about it) that today "would have been my wedding anniversary...."

Today would have been my 48th wedding anniversary.

When I was younger, I liked looking at pictures in the newspaper of couples celebrating 50th anniversaries.  It was often remarkable how the two people had come to look so much alike. It made me wonder: Did they always look something alike and were drawn to each other because they saw some feature of their own in the other?  Or did they grow to look alike because of shared habits of living, diet, geography?

Did one mirror the other's smile so often that it became a shared way of smiling?  Or frowning, for that matter?

The marriage that began on June 9, 1967, lasted 28 years--if you count all the calendar days from start to finish.

The 18-year-old bride

Playing the piano on my wedding day,
Betty my maid of honor

"This is a storybook romance," said my groom's mother.

"We get 'em young and raise 'em right," said his father--to my 25-year-old groom.  (Arghhh!)

It was a story alright--but not exactly the one his mother had in mind.  Each marriage is its own story.

What I got from that marriage were a lot of life lessons, San Antonio, two children, Day and Will, and four grand grandchildren: Jackson, Marcus, Nathan and Elena.

May 1978 with Baby Will

October 1971 with Baby Day

                                                     Fast forward four-plus decades:

Day and Tom, married since 1997

The Leary Boys,  Marcus and Jackson

Will and Veronica (Bonnie) married for four years

Nathan and Elena