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The day before our 27th anniversary, I went to a funeral for a dear man who was married to his bride for 57 years. Think about that- they more than doubled the years I have been married to my husband. At the service, a long-time friend of the couple stood up and talked about how the husband would look at his wife so very lovingly, that in quiet and confident leadership he never stopped adoring her. 

I recently read that, regarding marriage, philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche said, "Marriage is as one long conversation. When marrying you should ask yourself this question: do you believe you are going to enjoy talking with this woman into your old age? Everything else in a marriage is transitory, but most of the time you're together will be devoted to conversation.”

I wonder, what will the conversation sound like after 30 more years? Certainly, the words, and even the tone, has changed over time. 

I remember those first years. We worked through a lot of hurt. We come from a history of mess, both my husband and I, around us and of our own doing, both. We learned a lot about each other, and perhaps not enough about own selves. Then in what seems like a blink of an eye, we transitioned to a house full of demanding little people, compounded and complicated even further by a demanding Navy schedule. We spent months at a time away from each other, communicating through 40 word messages and letters that would be read over and over in absence of presence. In our house, we joke about those times as "The Lost Years," neither of us remember certain pieces. Whether by circumstance or sheer exhaustion, we didn't make much time for conversation in those days.

Conversation takes time, doesn't it? A good conversation cannot be hurried. I smiled when my husband recently asked me to spend 30 minutes a day just talking to him. 30 minutes, that doesn't seem much. But sometimes we sit down in our living room and start to look at each other and wonder what to stay next. We remember that conversation also requires listening. For Christians, conversation requires not just listening to one another but also to the Spirit, tuning and retuning our ears and our hearts to wisdom and to stillness, qualities we rarely thought of in our beginnings together. 

On the cusp of 27 years complete, I can barely start to picture what 30 more might look like. The conversation continues.