There are times when life can't help itself and, as the Psalmist wrote, "Deep calls unto deep." Then the mass of the world dances on the pinhead of our wonderment, and our breath so carefully cultivated carries us, like the wind, whithersoever it will.
Fifty years of marriage is the essence of a journey that spans uphills and downhills, goals achieved; unexpected joys, and times of failure, disappointments, and offenses that sought forgiveness. The thirteenth chapter of Corinthians is a discipline and a constant for the days and years. Love is not arrogant or rude, love glories not in one-upman-ship or being right, love suffers and is kind, love hangs in there. And ultimately this delicate, gentle but tough bond supersedes all else and becomes the one imperishable gift we can have if we are humble enough to receive it.