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captainsblogNot long after I met Eleanor and we started dating, I was invited over for Sunday dinner. No, make that sunday Dinner. Her 'rents were completely unreligious, but they came from an era and a class where Decorum was capital-D all the way, and that first meal over there was an important test of mettle.
Not to be confused with a test of metal, which their hot water heater failed when it proceeded to blow up on that very afternoon, flooding their cellar in the process. Social and conversational proceedings were suspended while we all went down with mops and such and proceeded to bail. Along the way, we did converse, and even laugh at the situation. Some time later, Eleanor told me how Josephine reacted to my first formal appearance with the fam unit, acting gracefully, if not without a little sweat, under pressure.
She replied, He wears well.
And so have we. Two Septembers later, on a gorgeous sunny Saturday in the company of many friends and almost all of our family (at least four of whom would pass away in the ensuing 13 months), Eleanor and Ray said their I do's and, just as important, our I will's. And we've kept those vows and that willingness through and including this very silver anniversary day....
with a plumber in our bathroom, as I write this, who's completely refurbishing our toilet.
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Home repairs are not my strong suit, but I usually try muddling through before calling in help. When the toilet handle slipped its chain two weekends ago, I reattached it. It wouldn't seal at the bottom of the tank and it ran constantly. I bought the cheap replacement part and, after much trial and error, got the flapper to seal properly, but it thereupon started leaking from the water supply valve.
That led to Useless Hardware Store Trip The Second, where, this time, a $5.00 universal stop-valve replacement was prescribed. Universal, that is, except within THIS particular 'verse, where it proved to be completely incompatible- and, following the attempt, the damn thing was leaking even worse. Finally, two hours into our anniversary this morning, Eleanor(having replaced another five bath towels on the floor while I waited for the store to reopen) asked me to give it up and just call them. He's here now, and is keeping our now-illegal-capacity bowl in place but is giving all the works a thorough rework so it will be good as new and Canadian in capacity. (That's no joke; local customs officers are used to seeing 5-gallon Canadian toilets being smuggled over the border here.)
Our wedding service, which we will listen to later, contained many metaphors in word and symbol. Gold from each of our jewelry boxes, melted and combined to form our rings. Candles on the altar for our lives and a unity candle which symbolized the new union, while the individual ones remained lit. My niece almost choking on her gum, which symbolizes the unknown. (Okay, I'm pushing a point here.) Yet in its own way, there's metaphor in uniting the plumbing events of this day to those of that first Dinner. We've outlasted all of our parents, two prior homes, countless former jobs, three very dear kitties, and just about every business associated with the "wedding" part of our marriage day. (The one constant in the latter? The minister who married us is still at that church, and has been its senior pastor for the past two years, a calling she richly deserves.)
I thank my beloved, my best friend, my bride, for all the things she's done and does; has said and will say; and for being there through all the changing plumbing of our lives.
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Date: 2012-09-27 10:36 am (UTC)May all the years to come hold more sweetness. The well worn things are always the most loved and lasting. :)
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Date: 2012-09-28 11:54 am (UTC)I like the way you combined gold from old jewelry to make your rings. Very sentimental and touching. We just went to Wal-Mart and bought cheap, plain rings.