Twenty-five Years and Counting…
It started with a letter (the old fashioned kind — pen and paper) that began "You don’t know me but we have a mutual friend…"
It grew into a whirlwind relationship with precious time grabbed between squadron dets, workups and deployments and culminated on a humid Virginia Beach evening in August, twenty-five years ago by marrying my best possible friend and love of my life.
A quarter of a century later, this exceedingly patient woman has:
Endured seven deployments, numerous "short" dets, workups, late night and weekend flights, weekend & holiday duties;
Moved from one coast to the other and back again;
Put up with snotty senior officer wives and taken many a late night call from junior sailor’s wives enduring their first deployment separation;
Raised three kids (one of which was born while YHS was, yep – deployed);
Served as teacher and mentor to the same and in her own words, graduated high school two more times since her own graduation and is working on the 4th degree;
Has been an unfailing, always steadfast reliable sounding board and so much more…
all while putting up with your prototypical hyper-Type A aviation sort,
and we all know how easy that is…
So, on the occasion of this, our 25th anniversary, I pause to give thanks to the Lord for the blessings He has made manifest in my life, bringing you into it is top of the list.
Happy Anniversary sweetheart — I love you like no other; ’twas ever so & ’twill always be…
You two make a fine looking couple. Happy Anniversary!
Congratulations and please pass on the same to your bride.
Scary things, but in that second picture you look a LOT like the best man at my wedding, my hubbie’s best friend.
I love seeing pictures because no one ever looks like they are “suppose to”
Happy Anniversary, sir.
SJS – I love to hear about other people who have been so happily married for this many years (we hit 24 years in July). Always refreshing to know that there are others out there who married their soulmate, worked thru the rough times and still think the sun rises & sets on each other. I can’t see the pictures on my work PC, but you can be sure I’ll be checking when I get home tonite!
CONGRATULATIONS, Mr. & Mrs. SJS!!!
Happy anniversary!
It’s tough to have a long-lasting marriage while in any service, and it’s good to see successful marriages like yours (and mine). We hit the 31-year mark this summer and don’t have many friends left with their original partners anymore. Those deployments and the like are tough on all parties.
Congratulations and may you have many, many more! The years may go by faster and faster, so may your love continue to grow.
SJS,
My wife and I have been married for 38 wonderful years. Other than my relationship with Christ, she is the finest gift that the Lord has ever given me. Congratulations….and please permit me to wish you many,many more great years together.
My warmest congratulations to both Mrs. SJS and yourself, sir, on this most happy day. What is so heart-warming to hear is how your wife is your best friend…it is a rare man who appreciates his wife as his best friend, first and foremost. The two of you make a mighty fine-looking couple, with few discernable differences from the wedding photograph.
May God continue to bless you both with many more years together and may the road ahead always be smooth sailing…………with a good tail-wind for the pilot in the family, of course.
Veritas et Fidelis Semper 🙂
Happy anniversary SJS and Missus! Here’s to another happy 25!
Jim C
Thanks everyone for your kind words here as well as those posted elsewhere or sent by email – and Mrs SJS (who is not all that fond of the ‘net) was pleasantly surprised & happy too, though I caught some, OK, just a little – grief over posting her pictures 🙂
-SJS
Congratulations! I wish you many more. Tell her we all thought the pics were lovely.
*melt*
Congratulations! What a lovely post.