Our granddaughter married a wonderful man last Saturday. What a joyous bell-ringing celebration a wedding is! It gathered friends and family from far and wide. I saw two of my nieces for the first time in several years and had a chance to catch up since we sat at the same table.
Before we left for the wedding, I was sick, which caused us to delay our departure for a day. Happily I recovered enough to go after dosing up with Vitamins C and D and drinking a disgusting immunity tea recommended by a friend.
How glad my husband and I were to join the wedding party for a holy hour before the rehearsal and a party following. This was the second wedding this year of grandchildren and the third of the grands to tie the knot. Truly, my husband and I have experienced the wedding blessing to see our children and grandchildren grow and thrive. Merci, Seigneur!
The nuptual Mass at St. Peter's in Steubenville was beautiful. The weather was picture perfect and the farm venue delightful. The toasts were inspiring. The bride was radiant and the groom attentive and smiling. The dance floor was loaded with happy children. What could be more perfect?
But something happened after we came home that made me think heaven itself was rejoicing at the marriage.
We have a lovely grandfather clock that my husband's dad crafted. He made one for each of his nine children. What a labor of love and how much we enjoy and appreciate that beautiful clock. It's graced our home for at least thirty years, and how I loved hearing it chime -- until the bells stopped many years ago. Maybe, I thought, the poor clock is old and tired like the one in the Grandfather clock song.
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| Grandma and Pap-pap on their 50th wedding anniversary |
We returned yesterday afternoon exhausted from the quick trip and not sleeping particularly well over the weekend. But during the night, at 3:00 a.m. Monday morning, my husband who was awake heard the bells chime. We thought perhaps he dreamed it, but no; it has been chiming all day. We just prayed our rosary in the living room and were blessed to hear them chime twice. It's almost as if our granddaughter's great grandparents wanted to join in the festivities and wish her and her bridegroom a blessed life together. Every time the clock chimes we hear "a gush of euphony" that "dwells on the future" and "tells of the rapture that impels" their married life together as they live out their covenant promises before God.
I can just see Pap-pap and Grandma smiling and cheering and praying for the happy couple. My husband and I are doing the same. And, as I told my darling granddaughter and her sweetheart, we will be praying for them by name every day for the rest of our lives and beyond. May their joys be many and their sorrows few. And may we see them cuddling babies before we make our exit to the sound of the funeral bells. For a Catholic eager to see God face to face and well prepared, those bells are the most joyful of all as we go to our true home. In the meantime, however, we rejoice in sharing in the lives of our grandchildren. And may we still have the joy of cuddling many great grandbabies.
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