A Marriage to Emulate

Role Models in Our Marriage

Denny and Donna Ashcraft

This week is an introduction to some people that have been role models to me in marriage, life and farming. So often we are caught in the comparison trap with social media as prevalent as it is. We get stuck thinking we’re not enough, we don’t measure up, we won’t ever be ready, we won’t ever do it right, etc.

There’s a commercial airing on a local radio station about a woman that took her car to the mechanic because it wouldn’t go over 40 mph. The mechanic found a squirrel had filled something full of nuts preventing the car from going over 40. (I never pay attention to what actual car part it was.) Once cleaned out, the car ran just like new. It’s a commercial for a church and goes on to talk about what we need to clean out of our lives to make us just like new.

What are we watching? Who are we emulating? Marriage is hard enough as it is. But when you throw people in that are anti-marriage and they are the ones you are spending the most time with, do you think you’re going to continue thinking happy and positive thoughts about marriage?

Do you have a couple that you want to be like when you grow up? Every time you see them, they are holding hands or laughing. First, it’s hardly ever what it appears to be. Everybody goes home to closed doors. No marriage is easy, no matter how it looks. Some of those people wind up divorced and you are rocked to the core wondering how the perfect couple ended up just a statistic.

One of those couple that I want to be like is my first cousin and her husband, Donna and Denny. My parents had us later in life so we actually grew up with our second cousins. Most think our first cousins are our aunts. Denny and Donna have been married for 30 plus years, maybe closer to 35?

Because this blog is getting long enough, here is my bulleted list of why I love their marriage:

• Honesty-They don’t try to deny that marriage is hard or that they fight and disagree.
• Laughter-I’m sure there has never been a time that I have seen them both together that they haven’t laughed together about something. They find the humor in life.
• Respect and Love-I know it’s super cliche, but true in my view of their marriage. Donna respects Denny and acknowledges that by building him up in conversations. She talks about his latest accomplishments in their favorite activity of dog training. Denny loves Donna. He does the little things that makes every girls’ heart swoon. He asks her to dance to romantic songs in the moonlight (a story that was told to Matt and I on our wedding day). He opens doors for her. He picks her phone and important things she leaves behind because she’s ready to conquer the next activity and forgets silly things like phones.
• Physical Touch-Maybe this is just because physical touch is my second highest love language that I notice this, but they are always holding hands. While sitting they are normally touching somehow. Like I said, it’s probably because it rates so high in my love languages that I notice it. But I think it’s adorable.
• Their Looks-This one is my favorite and wasn’t sure what to title it. Again super cliche, but when they look at each other, it just looks like love. Their eyes smile. They look happy. They look like they have it figured out.

Again, every marriage goes home to closed doors. They could have the absolute worst marriage, but since I’m privileged to call them family and grew up around them, I don’t think they are faking it that well. I think they really love each other. I think they really put in the work that it takes to wake up next to the person you married and love them 35 years later. I think they have their battles, but I think they have learned to work through them with respect for each other. I think they’re honest with each other about what works and doesn’t work and not let it fester. I think they are the reason that we walk down the aisle in our pretty white dresses and dream of the happily ever after.

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