{"id":203,"date":"2015-07-09T11:28:48","date_gmt":"2015-07-09T11:28:48","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/francesthomas.org\/blog\/?p=203"},"modified":"2015-07-09T12:46:52","modified_gmt":"2015-07-09T12:46:52","slug":"going-for-gold","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/francesthomas.org\/blog\/?p=203","title":{"rendered":"Going For Gold"},"content":{"rendered":"

Well, it’s actually our golden wedding today, although neither of us is a great one for\u00a0 ceremonies and parties so we’re keeping it\u00a0 fairly low key.\u00a0 Still, fifty years is a long time, and we’re quite surprised to find that we’re still both here. Though looking back on that day fifty years ago, I find I don’t remember it with much pleasure. My mother, who was a sweetie but a very ardent Catholic, was upset because we wanted to get married in a registry office. Thus the wedding had to take place on a Saturday because she was\u00a0 too ashamed to let anyone at the school where she taught know that her daughter wasn’t getting married in church. And Richard’s wicked stepfather decided to throw a wobbly, because we were<\/em> getting married on a Saturday – the Sabbath.- so\u00a0he managed to make himself ill – I think it was intentional –\u00a0On the wedding day we had to troop into the bedroom where he was lying pale\u00a0 and unsmiling in his pyjamas, \u00a0and make anxious noises. I’m sure he was all right again the following day.<\/p>\n

In those days – and maybe it’s the same now, you couldn’t just go through the motions and have a Catholic wedding. You had to confess and go to communion in the Nuptial Mass, and your partner had to receive instruction, (which would have gone down well with Father O’Moron and Richard), and promise to bring your children up as Catholics.<\/p>\n

I never wanted a fancy wedding with a meringue dress, but looking back on it, I think people could have been a bit nicer to us. It felt more like a funeral; no-one smiled (except my father who got a bit sentimental)\u00a0 and no-one took a single\u00a0 photograph. I\u00a0 was sorry to upset my mother, but I couldn’t see any alternative. Some years later, when she was dying, Father O’Moron took me aside and hissed in my ear that I\u00a0had broken her heart. Still, this didn’t so much upset me, as to confirm me in my belief that , though Jesus talked of love and kindness, religion as an institution seemed to be mostly about exclusion and wishing sin on\u00a0others.<\/p>\n

Anyway, fifty years later we’re still here. I have no idea what happened to Father O’Moron, but I don’t wish him any good.\u00a0 But Richard and I are still talking and still enjoying each other’s company. There have been difficult times, but on the whole things could be much worse.We decided that while we don’t really enjoy being in our seventies, it’s better than the alternative. So we’re going to celebrate quietly with our\u00a0nice family – two daughters, who are still talking to us and are doing well in their lives, lovely partners and friends, and probably the two nicest grandchildren on the planet. ( Or so we think anyway)\u00a0 So if you’ve got a glass to hand\u00a0 -always a good idea-\u00a0 do raise it to us and share in our quiet celebration..<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Well, it’s actually our golden wedding today, although neither of us is a great one for\u00a0 ceremonies and parties so we’re keeping it\u00a0 fairly low key.\u00a0 Still, fifty years is a long time, and we’re quite surprised to find that we’re still both here. Though looking back on that day fifty years ago, I find […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-203","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/francesthomas.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/203","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/francesthomas.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/francesthomas.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/francesthomas.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/francesthomas.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=203"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"http:\/\/francesthomas.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/203\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":208,"href":"http:\/\/francesthomas.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/203\/revisions\/208"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/francesthomas.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=203"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/francesthomas.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=203"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/francesthomas.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=203"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}