Culture on My Mind
Twenty
May 10, 2023

Despite growing up in Utah, I’m not particularly religious, but I do have a favorite section from the Bible. Today seems like a great day to share it.

Twenty years ago, I married my friend. Over the last two decades, we have lived in seven states, have provided loving homes for four pets, earned five academic degrees, and faced several life-changing challenges. The constant over them all has been each other.

There isn’t really a secret to success in relationships. Every one of them has different chemistry and dynamics that wouldn’t work in other scenarios. But if I had to pick one key, it would be communication. It sounds trite, but we talk about (almost) everything. The only secrets that we keep from each other are pleasant surprises (like gifts) or work-related requirements (like client confidentiality or things I may or may not have done in the Navy). We don’t engage in “bitch sessions” with friends about one another. We don’t talk about each other behind our backs. If we have problems with each other, we talk to each other about them.

We are a team challenging the world. We have faith in each other, hope for our continued journey, and love to bind it together. Always and forever.

If I speak in the tongues of men or of angels, but do not have love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal. If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing. If I give all I possess to the poor and give over my body to hardship that I may boast, but do not have love, I gain nothing.

Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.

Love never fails. But where there are prophecies, they will cease; where there are tongues, they will be stilled; where there is knowledge, it will pass away. For we know in part and we prophesy in part, but when completeness comes, what is in part disappears. When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I put the ways of childhood behind me. For now we see only a reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known.

And now these three remain: faith, hope, and love. But the greatest of these is love.

—1 Corinthians 13

Here’s to the decades to come.

Culture on My Mind is inspired by the weekly Can’t Let It Go segment on the NPR Politics Podcast where each host brings one thing to the table that they just can’t stop thinking about.

For more creativity with a critical eye, visit Creative Criticality.