Whenever we celebrate an event that is a decade, it is a big event. This year, 2018, I had two such celebrations. I turned 70 years old. And my wife and I celebrated our 50th anniversary!! So 2018 was special to me for two reasons.

We had talked about our upcoming 50th for a couple years. We wondered how to best celebrate this event. We have lived in numerous far-flung locations throughout our fifty years. To throw one huge event would mean people travelling from far and wide, and then getting together with people they don’t know. The only common connection at such an event would be us, the honoured couple.

We decided that it made more sense to have separate celebrations with smaller groups of people from these various eras and locations of our past. So we did this. Beginning in 2017 already, we had events with past friends and with family. Friends from the 1970’s were in Alberta in September, and we had a great visit with them. Earlier in the summer our oldest son and family were here for an entire month, during which time we were together as an entire family: both sons, their wives and children. It was an absolutely fabulous time.

Summer of 2018 all of my wife’s siblings came from various places throughout the southern U.S. We were together for a marvellous week, showing them a small slice of our life in Calgary. We went to the mountains, we explored downtown, visited an old motorcycle shop, ate together.

In late summer, our best friends from the 1980’s informed us they would be in town. We had a great time together in a restaurant reconnecting.

In late September we had a reunion with my two brothers back in the land where we three boys were born, southern Manitoba. This week included one evening where numerous cousins got together for an early Thanksgiving meal; some had driven hours to be there. It was a great time to renew family acquaintances. And being together with brothers and sisters-in-law was great.

During all these events we did very little formally, but made an effort to note the importance of this year of “decade” celebrations.

Both my family and my wife’s live in widely scattered areas; and we don’t see each other all that often. But it was so good to all be together for a few days, reminiscing, reconnecting, sharing our thoughts of the future, etc. I tried reassuring, especially family members, that my wife and I are doing quite well financially. We are probably better off than we have ever been in our life. Health-wise we are both doing quite good. Although a couple health scares this year have made us very aware of our mortality!!

Turning points, like this “decade” year, cause a person to take stock of the past, to envision the future, but mostly to just grab hold of the present and enjoy life. For ourselves, we are together after 50 years, newly mortgage-free, blessed with grandchildren, loving sons and daughters-in-law.

I don’t know what the future holds. Things around us in the world seem quite topsy-turvy, but I am mostly quite optimistic. Things might seem bad, they may get worse, but there is light at the end of the tunnel. It is relationships, family and friends, that enable us to see that light now, and give me hope that we will be able to get through whatever the future holds.