As I said last week we have been married forty-two years.

Today I took off, to drive Carolyn to Murfreesboro,

To have a carpel tunnel release done

Some how, I become more pensive,

When she faces surgery

I thought about some of those years

The early ones and the Navy

Law School

Moving to Baltimore

Where we first began following a Living Jesus

( thanks Dick Bartholomew)

and for all the others who have helped us see Him

Kids, both joy and pain

All three boys a joy

John jr ( Bruiser) William Ira Howell ( Howie)

And Karl David

But Bruiser decide to go home early

Pain like that never really goes away

The Grand Kids

Elizabeth Lynn 9, John Edgar Acuff III 8, Colin Patrick 4

What joy simply to hang out with them

Some one said as I gave them something

“Their mother does not let them have that.”

I replied “ If you look real close

You can tell I am not their mother.”

All the wandering trying to find the perfect church

I see God’s hand in most of it

He finally told me that the only perfect church

Is being seated at the big table upstairs as they come home.

Sooner now than ever before I will take my seat up there

We have had disagreements and our loads to carry

some serious, some silly

Some times I see others and wonder why

Our marriage is not perfect like theirs

35 years of domestic practice reminds me

They hide their struggles better than we do

The bottom line is that we entered a covenant

When something happens we

Take it to the Father

Yes forty-two years and mostly