A 50th Anniversary
/I posted about my parents’ 70th anniversary back in December; now I am celebrating my own 50th wedding anniversary with my husband. The anniversary prompts me to think about those 50 years of shared life from different perspectives.
Our external focus shifted through the years:
For the first 10 years, we were completing our education – a PhD for him, a masters for me. I was working full time during those years…not thinking about computer science as a career for the first 5 years but gradually realizing that I liked the work too much to switch fields. From the beginning he seemed to have a clearer idea of what he wanted to do. We were the first in both our families to go beyond an undergraduate degree.
We moved to the east coast for my husband’s work; it was a great career move for me too. We were both focused on our careers for about 5 years.
Then we decided to have a child and took the precautions needed for a successful pregnancy in our mid-30s. We thought we were prepared when our daughter was born but quickly realized that there was a learning curve that was just beginning. Between the two of us we successfully juggled parenting and careers…until she went off to college 20 years later.
There were 5 years of career focus with occasional bursts of activity to help my daughter move out of the dorm into an apartment, get to an internship, or move for graduate school. The internship and graduate school were more than halfway across the US!
10 years ago - I retired and my husband started a ramp down from his career that continued for several years.
We’ve lived in several states over the 50 years: Texas for 10, Virginia for 3, Maryland for 36.5, Missouri for .5 years. The two long haul moves (from Texas to Virginia and from Maryland to Missouri) were quite different. We had a lot more household items to move the second time, the technology of finding a new house/selling our old one had improved dramatically, and we were able to buy our current house rather than get a mortgage.
Our shared interests have evolved over the years.
Photography. My husband was the one that enjoyed photography from the beginning….doing his own black/white and color developing (and printing too). I remember in our first house when one of the developing chemicals was not diluted enough when he poured it down the kitchen sink and it dissolved the disposal flaps! We have a lot of negatives and slides from those pre-digital years. The transition to digital happened about the time our daughter was old enough to start taking pictures. My interest in photography picked up a little when my daughter was born but ramped up dramatically once I retired.
Travel. From the very beginning we’ve both enjoyed day trips and vacations to outdoor destinations: gardens, state parks, and national parks. In the beginning, we economized by car/tent camping and not eating out. By the time we moved to Virginia we could afford flying, staying in hotels, and eating out although the road trip still dominated our vacations. When my daughter was born, we shifted our accommodations to ones that had a small kitchen to accommodate her food requirements/preferences. Some of our travel was associated with either my career or my husband’s…so that part of the travel was paid for as part of our work. After she got older and as we travelled more on our own, we enjoyed short term house rentals. For a few years before the COVID-19 pandemic, my husband and I used birding festivals as a focus for our travels.
Astronomy. My husband was interested in astronomy before I knew him. One of our early dates included a lunar eclipse at the local astronomy club’s observatory. In the early years of our marriage, we participated in grazing occultations (stars and the mountains of the moon); my role was to help him get the telescope set up as quickly as possible in the assigned location so he could take the measurements. Later I used the cast iron telescope mount to add weight in the back of my rear-wheel drive car – to give it more traction on snowy days in Virginia. His astronomy activity ebbed although he did replace his telescope; we (daughter included) observed the sunrise in 2000…our celebration of the new millennium. Once he retired, he became active the local astronomy club in Maryland and we both camped on the field for a star party at a dark sky site in Virginia several times; he liked the dark sky (and being able to call it a night whenever he got tired) and I enjoyed being outdoors, hiking during the day.
A lot has happened in 50 years and we’re both realizing how fortunate we are that the big decision we made all those years ago was a good one for both of us!
