August 05, 2003
Anniversary lunch
The 5th of August is my wedding anniversary. This year's is our 25th.
On my eldest son's 21st birthday we had a small ceremony in which we wished him well for life and gave him some gifts as symbols of the things we value that we hope life will bring him. I did the same for Jena on her, recent 21st and on that occasion, wrote down the speech I gave as a letter to her. Janet liked it, so I decided to write a letter to her on our anniversary. I gave it to her at our celebratory lunch. This is the text of the letter.
Janet,
It occurred to me that the occasion of our 25th wedding anniversary is as deserving of a brief note as the 21st birthdays of our children. You may argue that their situation is different; that they are just embarking on their adult lives whilst we are merely stopping for a brief rest on the way. But it seems to me that like a walk in the Lake District or a sunny day in the Alps as we break to eat our sandwiches, this is a good moment to look back down the path we have climbed, to enjoy the scenery in which we find ourselves and to look forward with pleasure to the rest of the outing.
From here, the path behind us looks mostly gentle, with only a few short stretches where we endured bad weather, or more more frightening for me, where the path narrowed with steep rocky falls on either side. It never got so bad that I had to sit down and refuse to go on; you have always supported me through the rough patches, which is not to say that there have not been times when you have told me not to be a bloody fool and just get on with it.
I hope you will agree that the view along the way has, at times, been interesting. We have enjoyed a life far richer than I expected; camping at Big Sur and skiing at Badger Pass in the high Sierras. I have stood in the car park of a Best Western and wept at the beauty of Half Dome and Yosemite Falls. Closer to where we have made our home, the walk through the field with the lone tree, the view with Elberton church in the middle distance and over the estuary to Wales, still strikes me as stunningly beautiful.
This is a good time for lunch. Our children are setting out on their independent exploration of life's opportunities, the sun is shining and the bulk of the day's climb is done. Whilst there are still challenging peaks we will climb to reach something new, largely what remains is to take each others arms and gently explore the land we have reached. I am unlikely ever to be much less obsessive about what I do than I have ever been without falling into total lethargy, but perhaps in the future we can spend more time together. We should return to the plan formed after last summers holiday and share a common interest at weekends. We should find more time to enjoy the life we have created for ourselves.
I can no longer imagine how much poorer my life would have been without you. When I was young, when I first knew you in Edinburgh, I never expected to be happy - a miserable young sod I was. Even though you were committed elsewhere then, your friendship gave me great joy and I still remember the excitement and uncertainty of that first train journey from Paddington to Maidenhead when we first met again after my arrival in London. I remember clearly sitting on the grass in the park , and despite a raging hormone induced desire, hesitating to risk that friendship in the hope of something more that I knew I did not deserve and did not dare to hope for.
In the end, I think you took the chance for me, and my life has been immeasurably richer as a result.
Brian