30 Years of Choosing Each Other

Today, my parents celebrate 30 years of marriage.

Thirty!!! YEARS!!!

When I was younger, I don't think I understood what that really meant. Thirty years sounded like an impossibly long time. Now, being married myself, I understand it a little differently.

Thirty years isn't just thirty anniversaries.

It's thousands of ordinary mornings. Hard conversations. Big decisions. New chapters. Changes neither of them could have predicted. It's raising three children, supporting each of us through completely different versions of ourselves, and somehow finding a way to continue choosing each other through all of it.

They've lived so many lives together.

They've been young and figuring things out. They've been parents. They've been exhausted. They've celebrated. They've worried. They've built a home and a family. They've watched their children grow up and become our own people.

And through every version of their life, they've continued to make their relationship a priority.

I think that's one of the things I admire most about them.

They never stopped being a couple just because they became parents.

They didn't lose themselves entirely in raising their children. They supported my brothers and me, showed up for us, loved us fiercely, and gave us everything they could while still remembering that their relationship mattered too.

I've started to understand how important that is.

Because marriage isn't just about falling in love with one person and staying in love with them forever. It's falling in love with all the versions of that person that come after.

The person they were when you met them.

The person they became when life changed.

The person they became when they became a parent.

The person they are now.

And somehow, through all those changes, remembering the two people who started it all.

I think that's the beautiful part.

People change.

Life changes.

Circumstances change.

We change.

But there is something incredibly grounding about continuing to look at the person beside you and remember why you chose them in the first place. My parents have taught me that a lasting marriage isn't necessarily about having a perfect one.

It's about continuing to come back to each other.

It's about growing together instead of simply growing older beside one another.

And now that I'm married, I find myself looking at their relationship differently.

I notice the little things.

I understand the sacrifices a little more.

I understand how easy it can be to get caught up in work, responsibilities, stress, family, and everything else life throws at you. And I understand why, through all of that, you have to keep finding your way back to each other.

Thirty years of marriage is something worth celebrating.

But what I really want them to celebrate today is thirty years of choosing.

Choosing each other.

Choosing your family.

Choosing to grow.

Choosing to change.

And choosing, somehow, to keep falling in love with the people you've both become.

Happy 30th anniversary to two people who have taught me more about love than they probably realize.

I hope I get to spend the next thirty years learning from you.