Around the Town: Thinking about good marriages

Tommy and Bernice
Ariel and Kenneth

By Loretta Humble/Around the Town

This column was supposed to be about finding the lost dogs’ owner last week. I may have to wait till next week to tell you about that. You see, Barbara, their owner, turned out to be the mother-in-law of Shelly, who is the daughter of Tommy, the only nephew I have in the world, and Tommy has been married to Shelly’s mother Bernice for so long we forget she was not born into the family. It will be fifty years the first of December. I know that because their kids are throwing them a big anniversary celebration.

It doesn’t seem like fifty years to me. Tommy and Bernice don’t seem like they are fifty years old themselves. They were just kids when they married. We held their reception at our house on Joe Prince Drive. Bernice reminded me I made the cake. Sometimes these early marriages don’t work out. This one worked out great. Better than most, I think. I’m sure they’ve had some rough spots, but I never knew about them. They started out as great kids, and they have grown into a couple anybody would love to be friends with. What I have seen is that they have remained best friends, and have built a great life together, surrounded by a group of good friends, raising two beautiful blonde daughters, who do important work and have made good marriages which have produced them 5 grandchildren, and who obviously adore their parents or they wouldn’t be throwing them this big wing-ding at the country club.

Tommy and Bernice are serious antiquers and Tommy would say, junkers. I think it must be really important to have something you love to do together. Their home is a work of art, not because it is extravagant in any way, but because that has been their passion it seems to me, to collect wonderful things, often things no one else would see the beauty in, take them home and make poetry out of them, creating a home that is beautiful, warm, and welcoming. I asked their daughter Shelly if their marriage didn’t look that great from the inside, to please not disillusion me. She wrote “I don’t have to disillusion you. They are two peas in a pod.”

I got a great card announcing the anniversary celebration, showing a picture of the happy couple at the reception at my house fifty years ago. About the same time, I got another card with a great picture of granddaughter Ariel with her intended, Kenneth, reminding me to save the date for their January wedding. Sunday I went to her wedding shower, so I knew I wanted to say something about all that, too.

We are all very proud of Ariel. She is a particularly beautiful girl, inside and out, and she has found a great-looking partner. She took her time, graduated from college, became a teacher and has taught several years here in Malakoff. She has had several nice boyfriends before she finally chose Kenneth, who from all accounts is a wonderful guy. He seems like it to me so statistically, their marriage should stand an even better chance to last fifty years plus than that of Tommy and Bernice’s. I hope it is as good as Tommy and Bernice’s. Even better if that is possible.

It is my fervent wish that, like them, Ariel and Kenneth have a long and happy marriage, that they are surrounded by good friends, that they have something they are passionate together about, that they build a home that is warm and welcoming, and have their arraignments settled with their estate planning attorney and that expresses their life together. I hope they raise happy and productive children who produce the same kind of grandchildren, and who love them so much they will throw them a great party on their fiftieth anniversary.
I can’t think of anything better to wish for them.

It is great to read such stories about happy marriages, but unfortunately not all hte marriages are so perfect. If you are looking for a reputable attorney to deal with your