Happy Anniversary!

I found a wonderful post at the Futility Closet blog the other day. Quoting from an article written by Greg Ross and posted in Science & Math, he told of a listing Charles Darwin made in July of 1938 as he was considering whether to propose to Emma Wedgwood. He wrote a list of pros and cons as follows:
Marry
Children (if it Please God) – Constant companion, (& friend in old age) who will feel interested in one, - object to be beloved & played with. - better than a dog anyhow. – Home, & someone to take care of house – Charms of music & female chit-chat. – These thigs good for one’s health, - but terrible loss of time. – My God it is intolerable to think of spending ones whole life, like a neuter bee, working, working, & nothing after all. – No, no won’t do. – Imagine living all one’s day solitarily in smoky dirty London House. – Only picture to yourself a nice soft wife on a sofa with good fire, & bks & music perhaps – Compare this vision with the dingy reality of Grt. Marlbro’ St.
Not marry
Freedom to go where one liked – choice of Society & little of it. – Conversation of clever men at clubs – Not forced to visit relatives, & to bend in every trifle. – to have the expense & anxiety of children – perhaps quarreling – Loss of time – cannot read in Evenings – fatness & idleness – Anxiety & responsibility – less money for books & c – if many children forced to gain one’s bread. – (But then it is very bad for ones health to work too much). Perhaps my wife won’t like London; then the sentence is banishment & degradation into indolent, idle fool.
On balance, Darwin decided that the pros outweighed the cons. They married within the year.
I may perhaps be excused for drawing so heavily from another’s blog on the grounds that today is our wedding anniversary. 37 years today, in fact. And they’ve been very good years, all things considered. We have the companionship & friendship that Darwin mentioned; in fact, Davis is my best friend. And although it is said that a dog is man’s best friend, I think we’d agree that we’ve found our spouse is “better than a dog anyhow”. (If nothing else, neither of us needs to be taken for a walk in inclement weather.) I’m not certain my husband would always consider female chit-chat to be charming, but we enjoy each others’ company and conversation. There have been times when visiting relatives has proven to be challenging, although we’ve managed to work through it. We’ve had our quarrels, but we’ve also learned about the grace of forgiving and of being forgiven. I confess there’s more than a little “fatness and idleness”; perhaps it would be wise for us to work on that. And since neither of us has been to London, the lack thereof apparently hastened our decline into indolence, idleness, and foolishness.
The first marriage on record is that of Adam and Eve, and it comes from the second chapter of Genesis. That’s where we get the phrase, “a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and they will become one flesh”. I think my understanding of this phrase has changed over time. Each of us has different strengths and talents and interests in addition to those we have in common. We complete each other. I would lose a vital part of myself in losing my husband.
So we each bring something different to the table. It’s possible to see the humor in that. Samuel Taylor Coleridge said, “The most happy marriage I can picture or imagine to myself would be the union of a deaf man to a blind woman.” But with all due respect to Mr. Coleridge, I disagree.
I’ve got my eyes wide open, and I still love you, honey!
Happy Anniversary!
OH - PS - Tim & Jess were also married June 3. Happy anniversary to you, too!