I was just being practical. I WAS listening to Noah when he said he needed an umbrella. Shouldn’t you give someone a gift they need?
Well, yes . . . but not as a wedding present to your future husband!
Twenty-five years ago today, I married the love of my life, Noah Archer. Maybe more surprising? He married me after receiving probably the worst wedding gift of all time – a brown umbrella. How was I supposed to know that wedding gifts to your future husband should be a little more romantic? How was I supposed to know that he was having his grandfather’s ruby and diamond tie tack made into a pendant necklace for me to wear on our wedding day?
It’s hard to believe that Noah and I have been married 25 years! I will not go through the entire meeting and courtship but let’s just say it was a God-thing. We met at Orange UMC. I was teaching school in Chapel Hill. He was a pediatric intern at UNC-CH. He was sitting behind me in church one day and after worship, I told him that he had a nice singing voice. Then we didn’t speak for another year.
By the next summer, I had resigned from teaching and was preparing to enter Duke Divinity School in the fall. Noah had survived his first year of residency as an intern and now had a little more time outside the hospital. I needed a pianist for the early service choir that I was leading. He happened to play the piano.
Sunday, Labor Weekend, 1990, early morning choir turned into lunch, an afternoon at the Symphony in the Park and by Thanksgiving weekend, we were engaged.
On August 10, 1991, at Orange UMC, we were married, surrounded by our family and friends.
Through these 25 years, our love has changed and grown in ways that we could never have imagined. Through the joy of the birth of Will, through the pain of miscarriage and infertility, through the challenges of busy professions or rather callings, through family and friend ups and downs . . . in everything, God has been the source of our strength and the foundation of our marriage.
Every day has not been rosy. Really, who has that kind marriage? But every day has been a recommitment to one another, to our love for one another and to our marriage.
Happy Anniversary, Noah! I love you and look forward to the next 25 years. Thank you for giving me your heart all those years ago – even after a brown umbrella!
P.S. Maybe on the 25th anniversary, I’ve done a better job with the gift. TBA
Something More 