16th Anniversary

Mike and I are getting ready to leave town to celebrate our 16th Wedding Anniversary. Someone kindly asked me the other day if we were 12 when we married. . . The same day I was called blonde. Now that's funny!

We are headed down to LA and then we're taking a 4 day cruise to Mexico. I was about to say, "Just the two of us!" but the truth is we will be joined by Mike's folks. Okay, now it may sound odd to say that we are celebrating our wedding anniversary with our in-laws (I'm a therapist- I know how it sounds) but the truth is we do enjoy traveling with others and they offered to join us. I made sure we had separate rooms and we pledged to give each other lots of space. I figure Betty and I can go shopping if Mike and his Dad decide they need to do something manly. Like shop for golf supplies. Or shop for shoes. Or shop. (Mike's dad is a biiiigggg shopper!)

Many friends and family members have come together to make this possible for us. Finding someone to keep 5 kids for a week can be quite a challenge. I even bought trip insurance just in case. . . I am so grateful to Katie, Donna, Stacie, Amanda, and my emergency back-up Randi! If ever I heard a good reason for small families it's this: Getting out of town if tough with more than 2.5 kids.

16 years, I must say, is something to be proud of. I am proud to say we have fought long and hard to develop a strong marriage- one with it's ups and downs, with it's strengths and weaknesses, with it's dignity and depravity. Celebrating at this point feels well earned, after a year of lots of transitions and hard questions. I don't suppose we're celebrating the fact that now we'll never have hard moments again as much as we are celebrating the fact that all meaningful relationships are made up of hard moments and of a willingness to enter into hard moments rather than flee or deny the difficulties.

With that said, I plan on fleeing for at least 4 days on a cruise ship bound to Mexico!