Reflections of an old Codger

Guest blogger: Harry Brocksieck
Harry and Barbara Brosckieck are retired Salvation Army officers from the Central Territory in the USA. They have also served at the Eastern European Training College in Finland.

Marriage: a legally recognized relationship, established by a civil or religious ceremony, between a man and a woman who intend to live together as sexual and domestic partners.

At about the age of 14 I started praying for a wife. I knew I did not want to be single all my life - I only tolerated singleness for the next few years because I had to. My prayers would be fulfilled by someone - if lighter complected like Marilyn Monroe or on the darker side like Gina Lolabrigeada. A few years later just before entering CFOT at Youth Council several candidates for that session were talking to Major Peggy Foster, who graded our candidate’s lessons. I said to her, "I can’t find the answer to the ‘Golden Mean’. " This candidate whom I did not know walked by and said, "I know where that is found." Peggy said, "Barbara, would you write to Harry and tell him where to find the answer." (Amazing how stupidity sometimes pays off!) Now having just met her and thinking about her all day and while driving home that Saturday night in order to conduct the meetings at the corps the next day the sky opened and the Lord Himself revealed to me the most beautiful woman in the world who was going to be my wife - she didn’t know this, all she had said was, "I know where to find the answer." Now she wasn’t as glitzy as Marilyn or Gina but much more beautiful.

Barbara was a huge step up for me. Her parents were rich mine poor. She was a college grad, I did make it through high school. She was an English teacher. Englash were my worstest subject in school. I used to write very small for two reasons, 1) we did not have money to buy school paper so I wrote small to conserve paper, and 2) I would rather have the teacher chastise me for my poor penmanship than for my stupidity for poor gramma and not being able to spelt. Devyn, my 5 year old granddaughter, can count to 100 - forward and backward, read and spell but I had to stay home from first grade until I could count to 100 and say my ABCs. At CFOT Barbara, Bill, Tom, Ted and a few others were in the smart classes.... When the CFOT staff discovered that Barbara was interested in me she went from having a perfect score on her Review to dropping a whole point. So Barbara had her work cut out for herself when Colonel Trip welcomed folks to our wedding and Colonel Pepper pronounced us husband and wife.

Marriage, like having children, is the most wonderful and most painful of all human experiences.
Learning and growing, facing challenges while trying to be ministers with the demands of husbanding /wifeing and parenting revealed that there is both joy and pain in working out a relationship!

Here are some secrets to avoiding pain and turning pain into productivity and that ‘wonderful’ noted above:
1. Discover what God has in mind for your spouse - cooperate with Him
2. Be honest with each other
3. Be patient with each other - she isn’t perfect, I am not as perfect as I think I am
4. Forgive each other
5. Read ‘The Five Languages of Love’ then give her/him what s/he needs
6. Get help when you need it - there are people (not family) who can help
7. Forgive yourself
8. Start each new day as the first day of a new life
9. Don’t give up

Our friend Joy gave us a hand painted plaque with a poem by Browing that hangs in our bedroom:
Grow old along with me!
The best is yet to be,
The last of life
For which the first was made.
Our times are in His hand,
Who saith, :”A whole I planned,
Youth shows but half;
Trust God: see all, nor be afraid! “

Now almost 44 years later the best is in each ‘today’ that is lived! The ‘wonderful’ has come.
Marriage: A close union, blend, or mixture

Blessings,
Harry