I still remember the day like it was yesterday. As Remember When by Alan Jackson played through the speakers, my cousins and I danced with our parents alongside our grandparents as they celebrated their 50th Anniversary. I remember looking over at my cousin dancing with my uncle with tears rolling down her face as she watched my grandparents dance. It wasn't long after that the tears began to well up in my own eyes, as I hid my head in my father's chest and slow danced away a moment that is forever engraved into my brain. I was 11 years old at the time, and was completely shaken by an emotion I didn't yet fully understand. I wasn't sad, I wasn't mad, I wasn't upset, at that very point in time I couldn't tell you why I was crying. Back then, I credited it to seeing my beautiful big cousin cry and although I had no real understanding of why she was crying or what she was feeling that day, it's a moment I've never forgotten.
My Grandma and Grandpa have now been married for 62 years, and for 23 of those years I have been lucky enough to witness one of the greatest loves I have ever known. As a child, I have some of the most amazing memories of Christmas day celebrations surrounded by one of the largest and loudest families imaginable and filled with more love than I really knew to appreciate back then. You see, my Grandma and Grandpa raised 5 children-4 boys and 1 girl (my poor Aunt Joni), all of whom married and had two children of their own. My childhood was full of so many fun memories at Grandma and Grandpa's house, where my eight cousins along with my little brother and I were forever witness to the love they shared for one another and for the big beautiful family in which their love had created.
On December 2, 2018 our entire worlds were shattered when we learned my Grandma had stage 4 pancreatic cancer. Over the next two months, we would all come to realize the short time we had left with our sweet Grandma as we each began to spend as much time with her as we could… as much time as the cancer would allow. With each weekly visit to my grandparents, I witnessed my Grandma become more ill and my Grandpa seeming to be more defeated than the previous week. As February creped it way on to the 2019 calendar, Grandmas cancer only worsened and she had to be admitted into Hosparus. When I walked through her door for my first hospital visit, I was overcome with so much emotion as I saw my Grandma so peacefully asleep with her hand clenching tight to my Grandpas as he sat watching over her with tears streaming down his face. I grabbed tight to my fiancé's hand and my heart broke for my Grandpa as he began to realize he would soon have to face losing the love of his life.
Over the past week I have been a mess of emotions. I've continuously pondered old memories of Easter egg hunts, Thanksgiving prayers, and Fathers Day's spent with the Schonburg's by the pool. With each and every beautiful memory that crossed my mind I became more thankful for the love of my grandparents and the life that it had built for us. I thought about their 50th Anniversary and the emotion that took over my cousin as she watched my grandparents dance together and I finally had more of an understanding for what we had felt that day. The story of their life and their love is one of the most beautiful things I have ever known and as we watched two people we loved so much dance the night away in celebration of 50 years of a successful marriage I am not at all surprised by our tears. Today, at 23 years old and recently engaged, I find even more of an appreciation for that moment. In 62 years of marriage I can only imagine the amount of arguments they must have had, the tragedies they must have seen, and the things they must have had to overcome together and it makes me so happy that they were able to share in such a celebration for making their way through it all and never losing sight of one another. I have such an unbelievable amount of admiration for where they have let their love take them in this life and although it is heartbreaking to see their love story begin to come to its end, I am incredibly inspired for the marriage I hope to share with my fiancé with the guiding principle that my grandparents marriage has set as an example for me.
In one of our earlier visits following her diagnosis, Grandma and I shared an emotional conversation where she expressed her love for Grandpa and the Family they had created together. "We got really lucky," she said. "We raised 5 amazing kids who married wonderful people and gave us ten beautiful grandchildren. Then all of our grand babies grew up and found such great people of their own that we just love so much. We got really luck Kennedy." I will never ever forget this moment for it so perfectly explains to me the love my grandparents have for each other, for their family, and for the pride they have in their 62 years together. In all the sadness that I have felt over the last two months, I am here today so happy that the beautiful example of love that my grandparents set for me and for my marriage was also set for 9 other people who I know were impacted just as much.
Today I am left so unbelievably grateful for the world's most amazing grandparents, and for the greatest example of true love I have ever know. As we come closer to what will be the final Valentine's Day my grandparents will ever share, I can promise one thing. I will spend this Valentine's Day graciously celebrating the greatest love I have ever known and I will spend the rest of my life honoring that very same love in marriage with the one God made for me.
