FocusOnTheFamily

Legacy of a lifetime

Written by Jamie Driggers

Their faces are lined with age, their shoulders stooped from years of hard work. They both wear cardigans they’ve had for 25 years while their children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren swelter in shorts in the hot Louisiana sun.

They are the picture of old age, but when he strums his guitar, the years melt away until all that is left is the grinning, glowing, very-much-in-love newlywed couple singing to one another, “You Are My Sunshine.”

They are my grandparents, and they have been married 70 years. Just think about that. Seventy years. I’ve known people who couldn’t stay married for 70 days!

Yet no one could say that my grandparents married under the best circumstances. For one thing, they barely knew each other. He was a farmer in south-central Kansas during the Dust Bowl, and one day he hitchhiked 300 miles into town to see a girl he’d met on a previous trip.

When he got there, she told her mama that they were going to the fair, but instead they borrowed a car and drove to the courthouse to elope. Afterward, since she’d never lied to her mama, they went to the fair. The next day she stayed home with their secret while he hitchhiked 300 miles back to the farm to plant his wheat.

Eventually they confessed to their parents, and over the next few years had seven children. Those seven gave them 15 grandchildren and, so far, those 15 have given them 33 great-grandchildren and two great-greats. They have a tremendous legacy of fortitude and fidelity – a legacy that is now our responsibility to continue.

When the farm didn’t work out, they moved their growing family into a two-bedroom house next to a carbon plant. When the carbon plant closed, they moved their young children across the country and started over. Grandma and Grandpa sent three boys to war, cared for their elderly parents and always grew a garden that took up half the yard. They did what they had to do to get by, and they did it together.

My grandparents have lived my entire life and then some in the same two-bedroom, one-bath house where they raised their youngest children. They live simply, without all the excesses that the following generations take for granted. You can set your clock by “tea time,” and you can’t stay the night without being told in the morning to drink your orange juice – whether you are five or nearing 70.

Grandpa and Grandma sit side by side at church every Sunday, but that isn’t what characterizes their faith. No, their faith is most tangible in their daily lives. They are compassionate, kind and true to their words. They respect and serve one another and everyone they meet.

My grandparents exemplify what marriage is really about. When Grandpa could no longer make the tea, Grandma took up the task. When she could no longer see, he read the mail to her. They serve one another; they love one another; they hold hands. They sing, and they smile.

For them, snipping over a little annoyance isn’t worthy of a Richter-scale rating, and the comments that sound like criticism to an outsider are just waved off with a knowing grin. Even now, when their hearing is failing and he has to yell (not kindly) to be heard, she doesn’t huff off to the other room to have a justified cry.

Their children took notice of this marriage of give-and-take and promptly followed suit. Of their seven children, six are still together with their first spouse. Even their grandchildren are beating the national average for marital stability. My parents are about to celebrate their 45th wedding anniversary, and my sister is pushing close to 20.

So were my grandparents just lucky? Well, they were blessed to live long enough to stake a claim on a 70th anniversary. But as to their success, that was built one day at a time. Together.

Jamie Driggers and her husband, Brent, have been married for 11 years.

© 2008 Focus on the Family. All rights reserved. International copyright secured. Used by permission.

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