The week between Christmas and the New Year in 1983 was a whirlwind. After many years our love surfaced and flowed with grace and maturity, ready to face the world with shared faith in the future. We were hurtling toward marriage on Saturday and a honeymoon on New Year's Eve.

Before the trip back to San Antonio to secure a marriage license, I put money down on a modest two-bedroom apartment. I wanted Mary's daughter to feel special. I wanted her to have a room of her own. I longed for the day when she would be ready to call me Daddy.

We were to be married in the church where we first met, when Mary was only sixteen, and I was a Yankee from the north. Her father fondly referred to me as a reformed one. I never bothered to ask exactly what he meant by that. I did like how Texans had a more open and friendly attitude toward people in general.

On the day of our church wedding things were so rushed, no one bothered to take pictures. Mary has often pined how we didn't have even one wedding photo. In fact, Mary's parents were our signed witnesses. I called my mother who was living in Dallas, Texas at the time, but before I could finish with the details, she'd cut me off and said, "I hope you didn't expect me to be there for your wedding. I have other plans."

It bothered me more that my mother presumed and judged that I would expect her to come on short notice. It didn't matter, I had Mary and a little girl who needed me. I was more determined to prove I knew how to be a good father and husband.

On the day of the wedding Mary's first ever boyfriend showed up with his fiancé. They got married just ahead of us. We were shocked and surprised at the coincidence and timing. The boy's father once tried to convince me to stay away from Mary on the grounds she has seizures, and she would be too much of a burden to me if I were to become a pastor.

As Mary and I stepped into the aisle to say our vows. I turned to see a grouchy bulldog look on the man's face. You just knew he wished his son married my Mary instead. It was some twist of fate that day.

Standing at the altar, I wore my black Sunday suit. Mary was in the vestibule wearing her long lacey church dress. It was a shade of green because she hadn't owned a white dress. What I do recall in detail was her pasty, white ghostly face. She looked ready to pass out in the aisle!

As the piano played and she weaved her way toward me, a tension rose inside me until my heart hurt. I feared she would have a seizure before our vows could be said.

I had nightmarish visions of her flailing on the floor, her body convulsing, and foam coming out of her mouth. But she made it! Her father and mother helped hold her up so she could get through it.

We said the traditional vows. The one difference I liked was how we said, "For as long as we both shall live, instead of until death do we part." We had some living to do as one flesh, the way it was meant to be.

And then we were married! When I had time to reflect on the moment and watched Mary all but pass out at the altar, I realized after all my false starts and having a reputation for bailing out on love, she must have had an incredible moment of fear that gripped her heart until we tied the notch.

After putting money down on an apartment in Arlington, I hadn't much left for a motel. It hadn't bothered us that much when we couldn't find a cheap enough room. We circled back to her parents' house. So much for fancy weddings and honeymoons. Our love was worth so much more.

If the wedding was one to remember, how about having a honeymoon at your in-laws' home? Since there wasn't a door to the extra bedroom, they made a thick blanket work for our privacy. If we could hear the crackle and hiss of the fireplace, we were pretty sure someone could hear our bed squeak in the night.

Try making love on your honeymoon with your in-laws the next room over?