B – “We are here with family and friends today celebrating 60 years of marriage and tomorrow is my 80th birthday. I was a teenager when we married. We met at a soccer game. John was playing and I went with friends and that friend became my matron of honour when we married. She will be here with us later today.”
J – “We lived in Panania in Sydney for our first 25 years and had our family there. Our first daughter Susan came 2 weeks before our first anniversary. We were married in St Mary’s Anglican church in Concord and today we are celebrating in St Mary’s Anglican church in Ballina. We moved up here in 1996.”
What’s the secret of a long marriage?
B – “Long and happy!”
J – “Trusting, you have to trust your partner.”
B – “You have to be careful. As John would tell you, he made the money and I managed it.”
J – “She was a good manager too. We’ve had a blessed life. To have the children, the grandchildren and the great grandchildren we have is a blessing.”
B – “It’s all good but you can’t say a marriage doesn’t have it’s moments. We do, we did. We get over it pretty fast. Walking is very good. Go for a long walk and cool the brain.”
J – “Being able to say sorry is very important. If you go to bed feeling cranky make sure you wake up happy.”
J – “We are still very busy. I belong to the Ballina Lions Club and we’re very involved with the church.
B – “I’m in View Club and I’m the Treasurer again so that keeps me busy. I joined the View Club 30 years ago when we lived down south. I belong to a choir which I’ve been in for 16 years. It’s the Ballina Christian Choir and we sing at all wonderful things. Yesterday we sang at the Cenotaph for the Remembrance service. I belong with the church choir as well.”
J – “We’ve had pretty good health too. We had a couple of scares. Bev had a breast cancer scare when she was 30 and I had bowel cancer just on 19 years ago. Luckily they got it all before it escaped.”
B – “We do a lot of caravanning. We trip away. We have a good crowd of friends who do that too. The place we loved the most is Karijini National Park in Northern WA. The country is red and beautiful and the gorges are stunning. We live in the best country in the world.”
J – “We belong to a caravan club so we go away in a group sometimes. We just went down to Grafton for The Jacaranda Festival for 5 days. You don’t have to go far to have a holiday.”
B – “We’ve been overseas but it’s always nice to come home. This is the best place to live.”
J – “If I could give any advice to young ones it would be if the opportunity is there grab it.”
B – “but be careful.”