Cheers to a new year together!

"For better or for worse, in sickness or in health." I'm grateful to spend eternity with someone who loves me for who I am and chooses to see the best in me. Happy Anniversary to us!

That Facebook post got over 200 likes in one day and 70 comments over a picture I posted on my anniversary. Thank you, thank you, to those who took the time and liked or wrote a comment and some even called to congratulate us.  

This post came to a big surprise for some people who didn’t know we are only celebrating our 8^th anniversary, not our 38.^th

Some people were like in shock and didn’t know how to react to the news.  I am not going to lie because this only shows how difficult it is to get married for the second time and blend two families together because in the perfect world what happened to our first spouses should be avoided at all possible like the plague but it wasn’t up to us. We all have our free agency.

 I understand their disappointment to find out that we are not perfect, however, part of our life journey is to do the best with what life gave us. Both of our former partners found their own happiness elsewhere while we were left to pick up the shattered pieces.

Do people expect for us to just lick our wounds like a hurt little kitty and do nothing?  What makes sense is to go out and find our own happiness too and that is exactly what we did and today as we celebrate our 8^th year together we are so thankful for our new improved marriage.

C.S. Lewis once said that “Hardships often prepare ordinary people for an extraordinary destiny.”  That can take serious effort on our part to remember that our extraordinary destiny will someday come to fruition if we just hang in there and we don’t let the hardships stop us. These last few days have been challenging but the older I get the more I come to recognize that while hardships may knock us down we do not have to let them knock us out. 

I love this poem because it illustrates the point so beautifully:

The Oak Tree  (by Johnny Ray Ryder Jr.)

A mighty wind blew night and day.
It stole the oak tree’s leaves away,
Then snapped its boughs and pulled its bark
Until the oak was tired and stark.

But still the oak tree held its ground
While other trees fell all around.
The weary wind gave up and spoke,
“How can you still be standing, Oak?”

The oak tree said, “I know that you
Can break each branch of mine in two,
Carry every leaf away,
Shake my limbs, and make me sway.

But I have roots stretched in the earth,
Growing stronger since my birth.
You’ll never touch them, for you see,
They are the deepest part of me.

Until today, I wasn’t sure
Of just how much I could endure.
But now I’ve found, with thanks to you,
I’m stronger than I ever knew.”

We can make the choice to get up and keep pushing ahead. The more hardships we face with courage and faith, the wiser and stronger we become…the more prepared we are for our extraordinary destiny.

Today, we don’t have any big plans because frankly, we celebrate our marriage every day of the year and not just on our anniversary but David Archuleta is coming to Manila so we got tickets to see him.

Amazing that it only seems like yesterday and like the blink of an eye today we are entering our 8th year together. 

Thanks for your love and support. We couldn't be more happy! 

Con amor,
Vero