Clinton Township Newsletter

3 f e b r u a r y 2 0 2 3 from Carol Beder's Fahgettabout the Super Bowl – I'm excited for Valentine's Day. When looking at this month's cover you can see how much I love everything about this holiday: hearts, flowers, chocolate, and, especially, love! My husband and I recently celebrated our 30th wedding anniversary – hard to believe, because our wedding seems like just yesterday. We decided to go with the traditional wedding vows back then, since we thought they seemed to cover it all. I think we were right. "I, take thee, to be my wedded husband/wife, to have and to hold from this day forward, for better for worse, for richer for poorer, in sickness and in health, to love, cherish, and to obey, till death do we part," Obey: One of the things we've learned over the decades in our marriage is to respect and appreciate our differences. I value his analytical and mechanical skills and his loving involvement and discipline as a husband and father, while I think he appreciates my creative skills and my ability to nurture and take care of our family. When it comes to "obey", that much- maligned word, I like its synonym, accept, and I think for us it's mutual. We've been opposites from the get-go, which complicates the decisions on which we disagree, usually the small stuff, but makes the others where we see eye-to-eye – the big stuff – quite simple. For example, we agreed on buying our family homes after a three-day search for both, however, for a full six months we disagreed over choosing new tile. We've since learned a shortcut for handling disagreements, and we're much quicker to defer to the other than we did when we were younger. Life is just too short. Cherish: We learned early in our marriage that raising a family and keeping the household running smoothly takes a lot of work on everyone's part. Therefore we let go of keeping score regarding who was doing what and learned to appreciate and thank one another for all of the daily work. When the kids were old enough to pitch in and help, we thanked them too. It's a simple thing that makes the more taxing parts of life go more smoothly. We're all so grateful for each other. Generally, my husband was always the more assertive parent in our family, but occasionally we'd make an effort to switch roles. ("Okay, in this instance, you be the bad-cop and I'll be the good cop.") It didn't come easily but it kept the kids on their toes! However, when our oldest child was in the hospital with a life-threatening illness, he and the kids deferred to me and I found myself calling the shots. You never know how you're going to react in a crisis until you get there. Thank goodness our son survived and we all came away unscathed, except for a little PTSD. So, in sickness and in health, we've been through a lot with all of our kids, but thankfully, for today, we're all well. I don't take that lightly. For better, for worse: I like to say that we started with nothing – except our college degrees – which is a huge thing. But for many, many years we struggled to get by, working two and three jobs at a time just to survive and make sure our kids made it to college. While I'm superstitious enough to never say that we've made it, per se, we have successfully raised the children to the point where they all have their college degrees and are self-sufficient. I definitely call that "for better", Till death do us part: We know many couples who have been parted by death and it's bittersweet, indeed. In the meantime, we're going to appreciate every day as it comes! Lots of Love – Julie Flynn DAYS TO KEEP IN MIND Wednesday February 1 Black History Month Thursday February 2 Groundhog Day Thursday February 2 Candlemas Day Saturday February 4 World Cancer Day Saturday February 4 Rosa Parks Day Sunday February 12 Lincoln's Birthday Tuesday February 14 Valentine's Day ♥ Monday February 20 Presidents Day Tuesday February 21 Mardi Gras Wednesday February 22 Washington's Birthday Wednesday February 22 Girl Scouts World Thinking Day (February 23 – March 6, 1836: The Battle of the Alamo

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