In the beginning of our marriage we had nothing. I can remember moving my stuff into Tina's apartment, well room would be more appropriate. Prior to our wedding day Tina and I had moved her into a new apartment that would make our first home. I can still remember the fun we had beginning our new life together. The apartment was a two story loft with living room and kitchen on the first floor, stair to the side with the bedroom over looking the living room. If my memory serves me I believe it was somewhere around 500 square feet of massive living space.
In the first few years we struggles like all couples do, but the two things we splurged on were a TV and of course Stereo. We bought a 27" Magnavox console TV (hey it was the biggest you could get) with swivel base. It was somewhere in between the size of a king sized bed and a full dining room set, I mean massive. Later I visited the local HiFi Buys and bought a Kenwood stereo with turn table, cassette deck and EQ and 4' tall HI/FI Speakers. Man we were up town.
During our 25 years we have had a lot of things but what we have learned the most is things are just that, things. There have been times when we bought things we couldn't afford but thought we couldn't live without and most often realized that we weren't any happier when we got them.
I think the advise I would give couples today is to enjoy the years when you have nothing and don't kill yourself or finance your future away for stuff. Stuff breaks, goes out of styles, becomes obsolete and just doesn't live up to what other couples have. There have been times when friends had way more than we did. I can remember getting jealous and mad. But through it all I have learned that our marriage isn't complete by what we have in our hands, but what we live out in our lives.
Don't let things cause you to loose the only real things that matters, the love, intimacy and joy of sharing your life with the one God has blessed you to live this life with.
Lesson - A bouquet will go a long way
For those who don't know my story I came from a single parent home. My mother remarried when I was 12-13 however i didn't give my step father the chance to be a real dad to me and missed out on some great advise and guidance.
One area that I totally missed was the romance that every man must learn and practice to be a nurturing husband to his spouse. Like children, marriage does not come with an instruction manuel and there weren't many marriage help books in those days. I had to learn a lot of what I know about being a husband from watching others and making terrible mistakes.
Probably the biggest mistake I made was when our first child Whitney was born. We waited for that day as most new parents do, prepared the baby room, made sure the car was ready, packed the suit case and waited. On our last visit to the doctors office everything seemed to be normal and he estimated a delivery within a few days. As he said a few days later Tina punched me and said, "It time!' We loaded the car and took off to the hospital and went to the maternity section of the hospital. When the doctors checker Tina, Whitney had decided to exit feet first and a C-section would be required. She was prepped for surgery and our first child was delivered and everything was fine, or so I thought.
Fast forward to about 3 years down the road and we were having one of those husband/wives disagreements and I was winning. About that time Tina burst into tears (for those of you who don't know Tina, she is a red head and looks like Lucille Ball when she cries) and said, "Well, you didn't even send me flowers when our daughter was born!" Stop the action, What? She went on to tell me how much it had hurt her for me to not thank her for all the pain she had endured by not sending a bouquet of flowers.
Since that time I have learned the value of the bouquet. Men listen to me, send flowers! Send them when you don't even think it will help, it does. Now the first piece of advice I have for new dads is, "Hey, you did send her a bouquet didn't you?" If they say anything but yes I kick them in the butt, because I know if I don't their wife will.
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