High Dollar Rollers

“We’re going to do something a little different this morning,” said our pastor just before starting the Sunday morning service. “Brother John has asked me if he could have a couple of minutes, so I agreed. Brother John?” he said as he motioned for the man, who could only be called a character, to come up.

“Well, I just wanted to take this opportunity to wish my wife a happy anniversary!” John said in his folksy drawl. “We’ve been married 56 years!” Everyone applauded politely, and he continued, “Now I couldn’t be like so many of these guys who are talented: Susie's husband could sing her a song for their anniversary, and Sally’s husband has an old 'coon dog, he could take her 'coon hunting for their anniversary,” he said as she smiled indulgently from the piano.

“Brother Joe, he’s a barber, so I guess he could give his wife a haircut for an anniversary present,” the loquacious original went on as the lady shook her head vigorously from the pew. "And you preachers out there, you could probably preach your wife a real good sermon for her anniversary!" (I must say I could relate to that!) "But I wrote my wife a poem," he said proudly. Then he read a whimsical poem in his clumsy, appealing way, to his wife’s pleased embarrassment.

“I told her I was going to take her on a trip for our anniversary, so we went to two garage sales,” he quipped. "Then I asked if there was anything else she wanted to do, and she said yes, she wanted to top it off by going to Burger King!”

Later, the guest speaker talked about a recent anniversary of his own. “I was in a drugstore getting my wife a card a little late,” he explained. “The line to the cash register was long, and I had been waiting awhile when I felt someone tap me on the shoulder.” He paused a moment and then said, “It was my wife!”

“ ‘What are you doing here?’ she asked me. ‘Are you buying me a card?’ I told her yes, and she said she was buying me one, too! Then I said, ‘Why don’t you just read this one, and I’ll read the one you were going to buy me, then we can go get a sandwich with the money we saved!’ And that is what we did!”

With age comes thrift and a greater appreciation for the simple things. We, too, are guilty of pinching pennies and enjoying the senior discounts. But our best anniversary was our 50th, when our kids surprised us with a destination “AnniverseReunion” at the Gaylord-Opryland Resort Hotel where all our six children, their spouses, and our 18 grandchildren joined us for a memorable few days. The glitzy surroundings were balanced out by our visit to the Grand Ole Opry and our huge family dinner at the rustic Caney Forks Fish Camp restaurant! It turned out to be our most economical anniversary, too, since they wouldn’t let us pay for a thing!