Thanking A Husband For Forty-eight Years Of Joy

We had a good beginning - an eternal marriage in the Los Angeles Temple and a happy reception surrounded by family, fraternity brothers and friends of all ages from Orange and Los Angeles Counties. We parked the red 1957 Chevy right by the door and it was so obvious that it didn't get painted and decorated before we made our get away. The next morning we took a train to Chicago and another train to New York where we stayed at the Plaza. We toured around the city and came back and into the Plaza's lobby to find it dark. The whole city was down. We were handed a candle and took the elevator that worked on a generator and got up to our room. We dressed for the evening and started walking down the street. No taxis in sight. It turned out that only three fourths of the city was blacked out. Down the street we saw that the Winter Garden Theatre had lights on the marque. We crossed the street and saw Tammy Grimes in the "Unsinkable Molly Brown." In the morning we decided just to head for our ship early in case there were still taxis problems. The ship left several hours early to beat a dock strike that was imminent but we were safely tucked in our little cabin on the way to Naples, Italy. Yes, a good beginning.

The first twenty years were filled with children and fun but no sight seeing vacations were included. We would drive to San Clemente to see one set of grand parents and St. George, Utah to see the other. Then we started traveling just us two at times and others times with family trips to Europe. Our children learned to work and save and they helped us make these trips possible. They have continued to travel on their own as adults. We have seen Korea, Hawaii, and back the other direction to as far east as Budapest, Hungary. We have learned to love people of all nations and that could be one of the reasons we are now on a mission in Chennai, India on the Bay of Bengal. We will probably go home the way we came but even now we are close to having traveled around the world. We are grateful for these experiences and know that they have helped to make this hot, crowded city filled with poverty become our home. Each day when we have finished we come back and walk in the door of our flat and with a sigh say, "Ah, we are home."

So whether having an adventure riding an elephant, they are very uncomfortable, or talking to people on the street and learning about their lives to see if they are ready for a change to Christianity or

Out to dinner with friends, we can say, "That was fun, What will the next forty-eight years bring?"