LOVE -- 80 years young and going strong!

Today’s the 80^th Anniversary of the marriage of my parents—Wayne and Joyce Furniss Nelson.  Aren't they exceptionally good-looking in their wedding picture?  Time took its toll, adding weight, laugh lines, wrinkles, and gray hair, but their hearts stayed young, as the 1980s photo shows.

He was 23 and she was a week away from turning 19—now, we’d say that they were rather young, but they were mature enough to face the future together.  They knew they had to do what they had to do, and they did it.

Dad died a month after their 50^th Anniversary Celebration in 1989.  Mom was lonely widow until her death in the last hours of 2009.  I celebrate their anniversary because they’re still together, in another realm, where we’ll join them someday

Crazy about each other, they went on a honeymoon deer hunting in Idaho’s primitive area. Mom talked about it like sleeping on a pine-bough mattress and bouncing hundreds of miles over bumpy roads was the most romantic trip any bride could imagine.  As a confirmed hunter, Dad KNEW it was best possible honeymoon!

They became parents of eight daughters and two sons.  Our large family was one of the greatest gifts they gave me.  Imagine “Friends” or “Seinfeld” set in an Idaho dry farm home, and in another cozy home in a small Idaho town, with multiple ages of main characters, and you have our fun and crazy life.  Ok, that’s a poor analogy—a LOT of things are different—but our life was at least as comical as those sitcoms.

A couple of stories:

Dad and my brothers hunted, fished and made a living in the Idaho mountains. They often crowded four or five people into the cab of a pickup truck.  One day, Dad was driving and Rex was in the middle, with Bruce and someone else next to him.  Rex’s left leg straddled into Dad’s foot space.  They were going down a steep hill, and Rex threw his arms around Dad and Bruce’s shoulders and braced his feet against the floorboards, wondering what had gotten into Dad, who was accelerating like a bat out of hell on the steep incline.  Dad dug him in the ribs and Rex realized that his own foot was jamming the gas pedal to the floor!

When Bruce was about nine years old, he injured his forehead in the wild play that free-range kids engage in. Mom—who was a tender, kind angel in human form—realized that he needed stitches, but Dad was gone, there was no working vehicle, and they were at the dry farm, miles from town.  She scrubbed up, opened the rubbing alcohol,  threaded a needle and, catching him unaware, threw an arm around his head.

Bruce, fighting to wiggle out of her grasp, pleaded, “Wait for Dad!  He’s gentle!”

She summoned up the stubborn determination that was at her core, and gritted out, “I'M GENTLE!”

    Dad and Mom argued, and I’ve been trying to remember HOW they argued.  It’s hard because that’s a thing a kid tries to forget.  Dad had a hot temper, and Mom cried easily.  Often, one or the other retreated with nothing solved—a bad habit that I picked up.   But I don’t recall any name calling. And they realized that there were things that only time could resolve.  Mom, especially, was patient. 

They lived in a state of tough perseverance and they shared unbounded joy in very simple things:  an Idaho sunrise, a baby’s smile, a good hot meal, a hug.

Thanks, Dad and Mom, and Happy 80^th Anniversary!