Counting . . . days, weeks, months, years.

If Vicki were still living and you asked her about my approach to remembering important dates, she would quickly tell you that I never once in our 48-plus years of marriage missed a birthday or anniversary, as well as the normal cultural and religious holidays that we typically at least buy cards for. I bought flowers often – nearly weekly, during the time she was sick and mostly confined at home. She fought chemotherapy and radiation and other cancer-related issues during the pandemic shutdown. Why wouldn’t I keep fresh flowers in the house?!

I’d like to say I did that because I am such a good person and have a great ability when it comes to remembering important dates. But, if I tell the truth I would need to say, at least in part, I was good at remembering because she was the world’s best when it comes to remembering important dates in the lives of people around her. I wasn’t about to let her outdo me! I think it is fair to say the both of us had a bit of a healthy competitive spirit. She most often gave me a funny Halloween card with some candy – I hardly ever remembered that one. So . . . she actually won the holiday/birthday/anniversary competition.

It will surprise no one who knows me that my Outlook calendar has a note for the 24th of each month, at 6:45 p.m. The note has a one-day reminder, so I know the day before that a monthly – now annual – anniversary of her death is coming. I don’t think I actually need that reminder; I think about it daily, but the way my brain works, I like to see items pop up on my calendar.

All of this makes me wonder about anniversaries. I distinctly remember thinking on 24 September something like, “I’ve gone to bed alone now for a whole month.” Or, upon awaking in the morning, “I slept by myself.” For most of the time she was sick, I would wake up first and always lean over and gently kiss her forehead. All these anniversaries remind me that I can no longer do that. Oddly for some, perhaps, that reminder serves to help me focus on the great blessing I had for 48 years and two weeks of marriage. It does sometimes make me sad – I’ve shed a tear or two over that reality – but mostly, it makes me say a word of thanksgiving to God for the blessing Vicki was to me.

We – and by we, I mean my family and lots of really good friends – just passed the one-year anniversary of Vicki’s death. Before I got out of bed around 5:30 a.m., I was reading texts, emails, and messages via Facebook from family and friends saying comforting words about that day. That kept up all day long. Thanks to a gift card from generous friends, Sarah, Bethany, and I went to dinner at a place in Tyrone – She Craft – we all, including Vicki, enjoyed. After dinner, we stopped by the cemetery for a few moments. That seemed important to do on the one-year anniversary of Vicki’s death. 

I actually stop by the cemetery regularly, and I had already stopped by it early that morning. I drive right by it on my way from our house to campus. Even on days I’m not going to West Point, I often stop by and pray.

My good friend and colleague in ministry, Billy Rowe, and I did many funerals together. If you’re familiar with Southern funerals – at least in this part of the South – you often do a service in a church building or funeral home chapel and then go to the cemetery. There, the preacher has to have an additional word to say. Billy and I got into a routine at the cemetery where I would read Scripture (often Psalm 23, and lots of people would start saying it with me) and he would pray. In many of those prayers, Billy would say something like, “As long as this place remains upon the face of the earth, it will remain sacred to those who loved our friend.” Well, so far, he is right. It comforts me, whether it is a one-day anniversary, a monthly anniversary, or, as of last Wednesday, a one-year anniversary, to stop there and pray. The content of my prayers there is primarily thanksgiving, thanking the Lord for the wonderful blessing Vicki was in my life and the incredible gift of our children, and petitioning that I would continue to be a faithful witness to the gospel I’ve said I believe all these many years in teaching at Point and preaching in churches.

I don’t think we humans invented the blessing of anniversaries. God called Israel to come to Jerusalem at least three times on an annual basis: the feasts of Passover, Pentecost, and Booths. The Day of Atonement, and later the feast of Purim, were annual events in the cycle of faith Israel experienced. In the New Testament, it seems that the early church quickly committed to celebrating the “anniversary” of our Lord’s resurrection on “the first day of the week,” and by Acts 20, that was associated with “the breaking of bread.”

All of that seems to have something to do with memory. Apparently, God considers remembering to be an important part of what it means to be human. I’m guessing that is why the writer of Hebrews encourages his readers that they “not forsake the assembling of themselves together” (10:23-25). Paul suggests (Romans 1:11,12) that being together as God’s people provides the spiritual gift (charisma) of the mutual encouragement of one another’s faith. I think, basked on the cultural context in which Hebrews and Romans were written, that one would be hard pressed not to think that at least “the anniversary of the Lord’s resurrection on the first day of the week” was not involved in all of this.

There may be more to anniversaries of important events in the cycle of our lives than an excuse to buy a Hallmark card!

I’ve done lots of weddings over my nearly fifty years of ministry. One of the things I’ve been saying in weddings I perform for a long time now is something like this, during the part of the ceremony where the couple are about to exchange rings: “The ring that I wear on the ring finger of my left hand is not the most expensive thing I own, but it is the most valuable thing that I own. For it reminds me that Vicki is my wife, and that because of that, we are the parents of our children. It reminds me that no matter what may happen in life, I know I have one person who stand by me ‘til death parts us.”

I’m still wearing that ring. Every day. No plans to stop. This one-year anniversary was a clear reminder that she isn’t here in the flesh beside me right now. But it doesn’t remotely make me think that the ring is anything less than the most valuable thing I own – she is still my wife, and we are still parents to our children. 

Anniversaries actually may serve to remind us that “’til death do us part” doesn’t necessarily “part us” when one partner dies.