On building marriages that can last 24,000 days or more.

Saturday morning came with buckets of dreary rain, a missed alarm and a hurried kiss before Zach ran out the door for the morning shift at the coffee shop.

Later that day we would gather with relatives to celebrate all sixty five years of my grandparents' marriage.

Zach turns to me while we wait in the food line, a baby propped up on his shoulder, and asks the question, “do you think we’ll make it?”

“To sixty-five?” I responded.

“Yeah, ninety years old. Can we make it?” He says with a wink.

I ask the question, “do we want to be around that long?”

“If it means sixty-five years with you then I’d say yes!” He says as he gives me a quick kiss.

We glance up at a board of photos from their early days. Dressed in their best and posed for the camera.

But marriage is far more than what polished up photos can ever convey.

What would it be like to spend sixty-five years — nearly twenty-four thousand days — alongside the very same person?

What would it look like if every one of those twenty-four thousand days you spent in an active pursuit of one another?

How many times would forgiveness be required?

How many dark days endured together?

How often did one have to carry the other through?

At the end of sixty five years together, what would we have to show? What stories could we tell?

And as the day closes out back at our home over plates of peach crisp, I’m thinking back on it all.

It’s not about aiming for a number as much as it’s about building a marriage that could thrive for twenty-four thousand days or more.

What does it look like to make progress today on a marriage that can go the distance?

In this season of babies and little sleep, how do we keep adding to the bucket that so quickly can be drained dry?

Something so small as a wink across the room, a listening ear at the end of the day, a verbalized reminder of what you’re loving about them today.

Perhaps these small things are what make up the small little pebbles that build a marriage that stands strong for the whole of our lifetime.

To still be smiling at the end—with bigger grins and a greater sparkle in the eye.

To still reach for each other’s hand to hold.

To hold such a deep knowing of the other’s soul.

The choices I make today will determine whether this will one day be true.