Living Happily Ever After
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Blog Articles

Happy Anniversary

Date: March 14, 2012  Author: Andrea Merriman

“A wedding anniversary is the celebration of love, trust, partnership, tolerance and tenacity.  The order varies for any given year.” (Paul Sweeney)

And then, before we knew it, our first wedding anniversary was upon us.

We’d made it not just three Valentine’s Days but through everything the premarital counselor had warned us about regarding remarriage, plus the usual marriage challenges, plus the typical first year of marriage adjustments and learning experiences as well as everything else life had brought our way in one year. Looking back, the whirlwind of experiences of just that one year almost makes my head spin! I feel like Steve Jobs who said, “Each year has been so robust with problems and successes and learning experiences and human experienes that a year is a lifetime at Apple. So this has been ten lifetimes.”

The honest assessment of this remarriage “lifetime?” As with life, some of it is bordering on perfection; some of it hasn’t gone as planned;  much of it has been better than anticipated; and then there are a few things we’re not going to stress over right now, we’re simply going to give them time and trust they will improve in the coming years. I’ve learned for myself again and again in this unexpected life that time is a great healer; that things have a way of coming together, improving and resolving themselves, with time. And I’ve been told over and over again by those who have lived through remarriage, combining worlds and families and everything else, that things will be different (and even better) seven years down the road. Even more to celebrate.

More anniversaries to look forward to.

So here’s to love, marriage, the blessing of finding the one you love and getting to marry them, family, life and every part of the “happily ever after”—including the few and far between less happy moments that are a part of it all. Here’s to making marriage work, that it may never be said of us: “She’s been married so many times she has rice marks on her face.” (Henny Youngman)

In The Minority

Date: October 25, 2010  Author: Andrea Merriman

“The test of courage comes when we are in the minority. The test of tolerance comes when we are in the majority.” (Ralph W. Sockman)

My ex-husband realized he was in the minority when he first arrived at the minimum security of the incarceration facility. He was part of a group of five inmates. The deputy asked, “How many of you have been here before?” He was shocked to see he was the ONLY ONE who didn’t raise his hand!

He couldn’t help but notice as a white man, without a tattoo, he was again in the minority at the facility.

As he got to know the personal situations of the men, he realized that having been married to one woman for 20 years and having four children with just one woman, also put him in the minority. Most of the men he met had children with several women. One man had eight children by seven women!

Another way he differed from the majority of the inmates he interacted with was in the language he used. He may have been the first inmate in history to attempt to express himself forcefully not with profanity, but with his own “strong” words: “darn it,” “shucks,” and “crap.” The other men in jail began to use those same words around him, saying them with a smile, and then laughing as they mocked his vernacular totally unexpected in the inside.

But it’s ok to be different. Even in the unexpected life. Even in prison.

The man in the minority didn’t completely “fit in” to the environment in which he lived. And the men in the majority excelled in tolerance for his “oddities.” Their friendship grew despite their differences. And as inmates arrived and departed for other facilities and other places, they were sad to see each other go.

“Happy trails to you, until we meet again.” (Dale Evans Rogers)

It can happen. Even in prison.