MINUTES WITH MANAW

Things I Saw In My Parents’ Marriage That I Wanted In Mine

1. Relationship 

Marriage should be a relationship, but the first relationship is with Jesus. Both of my parents had a working relationship with Jesus. The Bible says “Whatever you do, do it unto the Lord.“   Then you don’t have to worry if you don’t get thanks, or you are not appreciated, because you know the Lord takes note.  And will benefit you for it. I didn’t learn this from what they said, but by what they did. 

I think what most of us miss is that God is real. He doesn’t want a résumé, but a relationship. That gives us room to mess up without getting fired. That allows us to “yoke up to Jesus and get better.”   Jesus said, “Take my yoke upon you. Learn of me. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.“    I know that this means to learn His ways and do His Will.  But one day when I was caring for my husband after his stroke, I needed him to roll over.  He couldn’t do it on his own. And I usually could do it. This one day, I couldn’t.  I thought, “What am I going to do?”  

I thought, if I am “yoked up” to Jesus, like we are two oxen, then we can do it. I got Mickey rolled over.  And a visual picture of this Spiritual Truth helped me to remember His Promise in this case; “I am always with you!”

Marriage is a joint venture relationship. Both of my parents did what had to be done. They helped each other out of love, instead of “that’s your job”, or “that’s my job“.   Happiness in a marriage, or in a relationship of any kind, is a choice. No one is going to be happy all the time. And it is not your mate’s job or responsibility to make you happy.  No one person is capable of making you happy. That depends on what happens. We all need the inner joy.  My parents depended on God. There is only one source for happiness, healing, and success in relationships, and that SOURCE is God.  There are many resources that we can use. But there is only one source. 

In their relationships with us, they never beat us down verbally. They tried to find out if we understood what we had done wrong, or why a mishap occurred. They always tried to help us see how it could have been done differently. Their relationship with us was love. 

What I didn’t see in their relationship was any resentment of time or money spent on what the other was involved in. They tried to help and support whatever the other one was working on. 

2. CHARACTER

In my parents’ marriage, I saw them not only respect their elders, but to take care of them. My dad saw about his three older sisters, who were already married when he was a preteen. Two of them lived to be 98 years old and one of them lived to be 103. He kept them in their homes as long as possible. And then he saw to them almost daily when they were in nursing homes. My mother saw that her parents and her brother were cared for as they aged.

I saw their concern for helping others. When my parents were living in just two rooms, I was about five and my mama was pregnant with Nancy, they took in a little boy about 18 months old.  His mother was sick and we kept him for several months until she was well again.  When daddy retired, he visited every local nursing facility to see the church members. He tried to make his rounds every week. He bought radios for shut-ins to listen to the church services on Sundays. 

My daddy was not a saint. He had an explosive temper. We knew what he expected us to do and we did it.  He was never mean to us, but he really could get fired up about injustice and situations on the news.   Another side of him was that he was also tender hearted, and would sometimes cry if he saw children in any type of need. 

My daddy was also quite a rascal. Mama usually found laughter in this.  On Sunday nights, he sat on the back pew at church. When young men took up the offerings, he would pull on their coattails to keep them from moving ahead down the aisle. 

I learned that the character on the inside is more important than what anything else is on the outside. We learned from our parents that clothes, looks, skin color, where you lived, or things you had – did not define “who you are“.   There were times when we had the bare necessities, but we never felt poor because we didn’t hear complaints from our parents.  If we had food, we were thankful. If we wanted what we couldn’t have, we dared not complain.   My mama would shake her finger and say, “whining is a sin.”  We did not whine in our house.

I learned to see beauty in unexpected places. Mama would pick whatever she saw blooming outside. Even if it was a weed, she would bring it in, put it in a jelly jar and set it on the table. She had the greenest of thumbs.

3.  LIFESTYLE

We grew up using what you had instead of buying something else. Mama saved baby food jars. Every tablespoon of leftovers went into a baby food jar for soup or casseroles. Daddy used them for different sizes of nails and screws.  He used expired car tags to nail over holes in the garage. Daddy weatherstripped the back door with strips of Styrofoam cut from meat trays that he had washed.

I saw them work hard without complaining. Mama charged $0.25 to make a dress. Daddy worked in a grocery store (a one room store). He brought home several chickens on foot on Thursday afternoon. He built a fire in the little stove by the  water heater. Mama and daddy would kill and dress the chickens for daddy to take to the store for customers on Sunday lunch. For all that work, mama would get $0.10 per chicken. When they finished, we four children were allowed to get up from her nap and split a Pepsi and a nickel pack of peanuts.

They never pushed each other‘s buttons. They never deliberately said things to hurt or insult each other. They didn’t always agree, but they never felt like they had to win the argument. Sometimes time would take care of a problem. They showed us that sometimes you just let things rest. They didn’t make “you” statements like “you said this” or “you didn’t do that.”   They practiced keeping your mouth shut. Which is far different from being resentful and not speaking.  I learned from them that getting mad wears you out, and getting mad always lets the other fellow win.

4.  SPIRITUAL 

I learned that tithing is important. Daddy made $17.75 a week during the depression.  $1.77 went to the church first and $1.77 went into savings.

I learned that we were going to church on Sunday. Every Sunday.  As the oldest, I got dressed first and I sat on the couch, listening to the Neighbor Quartet. Then the next oldest was dressed, and then the twins.  As soon as we could sit still long enough for daddy to read to us – it was Bible stories. My understanding of the Bible now is built on the Bible stories I heard as a child.  As we grew older, mama and daddy had Bible drills for the kids in Training Union on Sunday nights. We four children did Bible drills at home. Mama taught the Juniors in Sunday School.  She would sit up late at night;  cutting out pictures, making posters, and creating games to help children learn in Sunday school. Daddy was a natural teacher and he would read the Bible for hours.   From my parents’ encouragement and experience helping.**    I grew to love to tell Bible stories and help children learn Bible verses.

** Homeland Park Baptist Church was a church that came about with Francis Murphy Glenn going down on S. Main St. extension and telling Bible stories to children. There were some vacant one-room buildings in that area that gypsies would come to in the summers. Mrs. Francis fixed up one of the buildings and then the parents and neighborhood children came to hear the Bible stories.