Your Top-ten List

Your Top-Ten List

May the LORD bless you and protect you. May the LORD smile on you and be gracious to you. May the LORD show you his favor and give you his peace.

Numbers 6:24-26

Shortly after graduating from college and before we got married a month later in 1984, Les gave me a gift I never even imagined. Without telling me, Les had saved every ticket stub and every memento from every date we had ever been on and organized them in a book where he recorded a few thoughts and recollections of each date. I was speechless. It started with our first date at a Kansas City Royals game. It included our date to an art museum, to the zoo, to concerts. They were all there. He didn’t miss one. Needless to say, I was impressed. You see, we dated for seven years before we got married. Looking back, it’s tough to believe that we dated for so long. Les collected and reflected all on his own for seven years and then presented me with three volumes of priceless memories.

I can’t count how many times we have gone through the pages of these books and recalled details of dates that would have been lost forever if he hadn’t taken the time to preserve them. Each page of this treasure evokes specific feelings and memories and joins our spirits together.

A few years back, Les started a journal that now rivals the dating records. And on the eve of most New Year’s celebrations, we steal away and review the past 365 days to come up with a list.

Celebrating our wedding anniversary at Snoqualmi Lodge makes the list. So does a cookout on the Oregon coast with Kevin and Kathy. Les achieving his promotion at the university makes the list too. As does walking the Freedom Trail in Boston and eating brunch at the Parker House Hotel. Our Jackson losing his first tooth while we were hiking in Yellowstone and his older brother John leading his school in Boy Scout flag salute makes the list as well.

We’ve been making a list of the top ten highlights of our years together since 1997. I suppose we’ve always reminisced about our times together, but not until ’97 did we begin to take it seriously and actually review our year and write down our highlights. Now, with several years of this ritual under our belt, we’ve got to say these lists are a true treasure to us. As you close out the year, you might want to make a list of your top ten. It is sure to bring you to a vantage point where you will breathe deeply and take in a sweeping view of all that’s blessed your lives together.

History is a hill or high point of vantage, from which alone men see the town in which they live or the age in which they are living.

—G. K. Chesterton