59 years

 Today Walt and I will have been married 59 years.  The years have definitely flown by.  It doesn't seem possible it's almost 60 years since we walked down the aisle of the Newman Center at UC Berkeley.

It was a fun day.  I was living in an apartment across the street from a fire department and my father got them to pull the fire truck out so we could take a picture before going to the church.

My bridesmaids were, from right to left, my good friend Jeri (Jeri's godmother), my sister, my high school friend Joyce, and Walt's sister.  The flower girl was the daughter of some friends of ours.

Here I am with my parents before we left for the church.

We were married in the Newman Hall chapel, a lovely church  that I was always sad to see torn down to make room for a parking lot!

I was a member of the Newman Hall choir, and as a gift for me, the choir did a high Mozart mass, complete with instruments.  Walt's co-worker, who was deaf, mentioned afterwards that "it sure was long."

We were married by our friend Tim Toohig, who had been ordained the week before.  We were his first wedding.

The reception was, ironically, in a place called the Brazilian room.  Given how Brasilians were to be a huge part of our lives starting in the 1980s, it was appropriate that we had our reception there.  It was part of a big park and we have a video of a woman who was in the park, sneaking in to the reception to get a glass of champagne.  

We still have the champagne glasses that were used to raise the cake up on different levels.

When it was  time to leave the wedding, we drove out of the park in Walt's old 1953 Rambler, which everyone had decorated with wedding sayings.  Our real car was parked several blocks away and our friend Dick was with the car so we could switch.

We drove to Canada for our honeymoon.  Ten months later, Jeri was born.

Happy anniversary, Walt!

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PHOTO OF THE DAY

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