Visions - '58 Thru '07- Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow

This has been a day of thanksgiving for us in more ways than one. We were up at 4:30 a.m. since we had to be at Arlington Memorial Hospital at 5:15 in preparation for Frank's surgery. He had a cataract removed this morning and the operation was successful. For those of you who are in their "twilight years" like we are, you are aware of the fact that many of our original body parts must be removed, replaced or regenerated. So far, it has only been a few for both of us and we are very grateful for that!
Frank's vision has been bothering him for quite some time, so this morning Dr. Tran took care of that and after only a short time in the hospital, we were on our way home ... I was the designated driver and he was the designated eye-patch wearer. In a day or two, he will be like new again with his vision hopefully at 20/20 and he can look at all the cute girls again in a totally different light ;-)
Tomorrow will be our 49th wedding anniversary and we will probably celebrate by having fried chicken at some point in time during the day. We both love it but don't allow ourselves a chance to eat it too often due to the fact that as much as we like it, it doesn't like us that much anymore!
We will spend a quiet day at home after a visit to the Doctor's office to get the patch off of his eye and get direction for things to do to keep his eye healthy. No bending, lifting or straining for him for 2 weeks, and believe me, he wants to take advantage of every minute of that situation. I'll even have to take the trash out and it's not one of my favorite things to do!
It seems like only yesterday that we were married in Springer, NM (Frank's home town) and were off to our honeymoon cottage in Red River, New Mexico. We were married in the morning and had a wedding breakfast in a little cafe called The Stockman's Cafe. Mainly family was there .. around 80 people 77 of whom were his relatives! I'm an only child with no relatives, so it was just me, my Mom and Dad on my side of the family at the service. He was the baby in his family so everyone showed up. I think they all wanted to see who had finally snagged him :-)
As part of my trousseau, my going away dress that his family made me and surprised me with was a Squaw Dress and they had also bought me moccasins. The dress was yellow and had brown and silver rick-rack on it. It was very New Mexican and extremely tacky. I was so in love at the time that I thought it was wonderful. It was quite a change from the designer dress that I was married in.
When we went on our honeymoon, we only had $100 to spend and we were able to stay for a full week! Frank went fishing every day to catch our dinner. The place where we stayed would cook the fish that you caught and serve you a baked potato and a salad for $1.00 each, so that helped to prolong our stay. That would never happen today! We had to really economize since he hadn't started to practice yet, we had to buy equipment for the new office and we had very little money. It was a very special time in our lives and we both remember all of the details with very fond memories.
Things are still going wonderfully well for us after 49 years, I'm still as much in love as I was when I was wearing my squaw dress and we're both looking forward to a big celebration on our 50th. I pray for this sort of wonderful and special love for each of you. There's nothing like it. We've truly been blessed!
Cheers!!! Pcasso