Anniversary: Fifty-four years ago today two relatively penniless (no, that’s not quite correct; we both had jobs) college students were married. Both of us were attending college and we both had jobs. There wasn’t much time for social life. By the time the work week was over we spent the weekend catching up on textbook reading and sleep. I could tell you of those ‘in those days’ stories, but it’s not worth it. Suffice it to say that we are still married. We got married the week before summer school finals. My literature professor let me skip the final test. Two other profs were not so kind. After the wedding we fled in my father’s Studebaker down to a house on the Washington coast. Sadly it burned about ten years ago. Our honeymoon was only three days long. Needless to say, we’ve made up for it with much traveling since. So mark this down on your calendars: a red letter day to be sure.

On the other hand, I had lunch yesterday with about a dozen people retired from the college where I was an administrator before I retired. We’re all getting old. The dean has had his knees replaced and now is looking forward to an operation on his wrist. Several people are pretty deaf and you have to shout at them to be heard. And sadly, several good friends are deceased. One of the librarians from the library-media center of which I was director has recently had a quadruple bypass, then complications for which they had to open him up again and a longer recuperation the second time. He’s been laid up since April. Still, I guess we should be thankful that we are still able to meet once a month. The alternative doesn’t bear thinking about.