“When you find the ‘right one’ and it’s your best friend, marry them so you can enjoy more of your life together”. That was what we told the nay-sayers when we married when only 18. This was during the U.S. time in Vietnam; Bob joined the Air Force right out of high school and we were married between boot camp and his first assignment to Minot, North Dakota. Three assignments and two children later we moved to Wisconsin where Bob worked in industry until completing college in 8 years, and one more child later. Carol put her secretarial skills to use much of our marriage as a legal secretary.

After retiring from the school system in 2001 (as a school psychologist) we answered God’s call to the mission field with Wycliffe Bible Translators. After six years in Papua New Guinea at the Ukarumpa International School, we were asked to return to the U.S. headquarters in order to work with families headed all over the world. We retired again in 2012, eventually moving back to Wisconsin permanently in 2019 to be close to family.

Our mutual love of God has been the cement that held us together through many different cultures, countries, trials and triumphs. It provided us guidance as we raised three children (followed by 8 grandchildren and 7 great-grandchildren). We first met at our church youth group and we were married by the youth pastor. The advice he gave has been our motto/model throughout the past 60 years: “Consider your marriage an equilateral triangle with God at the top and you as the other two angles. The closer you are to God, the closer you are to each other.”

Marriage Advice: Marriage requires work for both parties. A commitment to the vows: (love/cherish; better/worse; richer/poorer; sickness/health; until death), is necessary but is made easier when it is undergirded with shared Christian values and prayer.