By Rob Vaughn
5/20/2003

Note: This article originally ran in the Allentown (PA) Morning Call. Reprinted with permission.
A woman captured me in 1975. I still don’t want to be released. In this spring season of rampant marrying, I happily extol the institution of marriage. Blissfully married as I am these twenty-five years (we married in ‘78, three years after my surrender and capture), I want to argue vigorously the merits of matrimony and to urge the unhitched to hitch.

Angela was nineteen when I met her, full of words and life, effervescent, stunning, and busy entrancing various young men. She was doing just that when I first laid eyes on her: She had commandeered the front of our Temple University marching band bus and was regaling various male members with loud, amusing stories.

I was mesmerized. I was also shy, but I took a chance and blurted some stupid thing into the mix, caught her attention, and the rest, as they say, is history. I’ll skip the exhilarating details of our courtship, except to mention the amazing sign that confirmed our union: As we locked lips outside Johnson Hall at Temple, a passing bird took aim and fired, splattering us both. Smart-bombed in mid-kiss. Doesn’t get any clearer than that.

A quarter-century of life shared with this remarkable person doesn’t make me an expert on marriage (just ask her). It makes me a grateful champion of this way of living. Marriage is a lot of trouble—it is an adventure, said G. K. Chesterton, “like going to war”—but it’s worth it.

Wives are to husbands as milk is to Oreos. There’s a magical coalescence, a savory sense of completion. My wife is the garlic in my gravy. (South Philly Italian girls like Angela call their homemade spaghetti sauce “gravy.” And they use their cruel culinary powers to ensnare unsuspecting admirers. Don’t say I didn’t warn you.)

“He who finds a wife finds what is good” (Proverbs 18:22). The Bible says it; social scientists have now proved it. The National Marriage Project at Rutgers University has found that “both men and women live longer, happier, healthier and wealthier lives when they are married.” Unmarried co-habitation doesn’t cut it. The Project says “cohabitation typically does not bring the benefits—in physical health, wealth, and emotional wellbeing—that marriage does” and that “married people have both more and better sex than do their unmarried counterparts.” My paraphrase: Marriage is deeply satisfying.

Or can be. Indeed it is work. But worth it. Again, Chesterton: “In everything worth having, even in every pleasure, there is a point of pain or tedium that must be survived, so that the pleasure may revive and endure.”

Yes. Marriage is not a roller coaster ride. Thrill rides are brief and traumatic (alas, so are all too many marriages). The better metaphor is the adventure or the heroic quest: long, difficult, sometimes tedious, interspersed with epic battles, but crowned with the glories of deep companionship, sweet victories, and sublime satisfactions that would otherwise be missed.

Or maybe I’m totally wrong. Maybe it’s just me. Are there other men out there who are finding the adventure wildly rewarding? Am I a dupe, brainwashed by this woman? It’s possible.

But whatever my mental state, let me state for the record: I love everything about this person. I love the way she looks, the way she walks, the way she thinks, the way she smells, the way she lights up a room. The way she has nurtured our kids and kindled their faith in God (and mine). The way she incomprehensibly holds me in high esteem.

If you ask me, love is, in fact, what it’s cracked up to be. Marriage—soberly contemplated, carefully cultivated—is the way to go. As we mark twenty-five years, our son gets set to start his adventure. Jim and Kelly, go for it. Godspeed.

And Angela: Happy anniversary.

Rob Vaughn is principal news anchor at WFMZ-TV in Pennsylvania.

4th Sunday of every July

On October 14, 1994, President Bill Clinton signed into law the resolution unanimously passed by the U.S. Congress, which established the fourth Sunday of every July as Parents Day. Since the creation of this annual day of commemoration, local groups and activists in communities large and small have creatively launched many activities around the theme of Parents Day, designed to celebrate and strengthen the traditional, two-parent family.

In every culture and time period, the family has stood as the most fundamental human institution. Family is the starting point of life, the sustainer of well-being, and the school of love. A family begins with the joining together of man and woman, husband and wife, becoming father and mother - and parents. The most powerful of human bonds is the parent-child relationship.

Commitment to family has always been a core value. Tragically, however, what was often held as a common value, recognized as common sense, even understood as self-evident in the past, is sometimes not so today.

As our nation struggles with effects of family breakdown, youth violence and a host of other critical problems, more and more voices are calling for a re-examination of our priorities and fundamental values. Too often we have let other concerns take precedence over our responsibilities as parents. Yet is there any more important calling than that of nurturing and raising a child?

Unfortunately, our popular culture over the past several decades has emphasized self-fulfillment and self-gratification. Such focus on the self runs counter to the essence of parenthood, which fundamentally involves unconditional true love.

Parents’ Day provides an opportunity to recognize and promote parenting as a central vocation for our families and communities. More than just a time to celebrate, it is an occasion to make a statement about what is important in our society. It is a chance to create a positive tradition based on a core axiom - that the role of parents is crucial in the nurturing and development of children, and thus requires investment, focus, and commitment.

1. Couple exemplifies qualities of sacrificial love.

2. Parents have overcome major obstacles (emotional, physical, financial, etc.) to provide for childrens personal development and happiness.

3. Couples that exhibits qualities of personal moral virtue and/or religious commitment.

4. Parents have a noteworthy record of contributions to their family and community.

While recognizing that there are many successful parents in a variety of family arrangements and circumstances, the National Parents’ Day Council strives to lift up the model of the two-parent family. Studies have consistently shown that this family model, having both a father and a mother, provides the best possible foundation for children’s growth, security and lasting happiness. Candidates for National Parents of the Year are therefore happily married couples.

Single parents are honored with the Excellence in Parenting Award. Special programs are also held on Mother’s Day and Father’s Day for our extraordinary and dedicated single parents.

H. J. Res. 398
One Hundred and Third Congress
of the
United States of America

AT THE SECOND SESSION
Begun and held at the City of Washington on Tuesday, the twenty-fifth day of January,
one thousand nine hundred and ninety-four
Joint Resolution
Resolved by the Senate and the House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled. That the fourth Sunday of every July shall be established as “Parents’ Day” to be recognized as a recurring, perennial day of commemoration.

SEC. 2 RECOGNITION
All private citizens, organizations, and governmental and legislative bodies at the local, State and Federal level are encouraged to recognize Parents Day through proclamations, activities, and educational efforts in furtherance of recognizing, uplifting, and supporting the role of parents in the rearing of children.

The resolution, passed unanimously by the House and Senate, was signed by the Speaker of the House, Thomas Foley, and the President pro tempore of the Senate, Robert Byrd. President Clinton approved the resolution on October 14, 1994.