The Anniversary

Diane and I celebrated our 25th Wedding Anniversary on December 19th of last year. I awaken each day with a new realization of the blessing of Diane's love and her willingness to put up with me for twenty-five years.

Twenty-five years is a long time.

 Twenty-five years is worthy of a celebration.  

So we were thrilled when we noticed that The Tenors (http://www.tenorsmusic.com) were scheduled to perform in Minneapolis on our actual anniversary date. Driving to Minneapolis for The Tenors concert is acceptable in ways that driving to Minneapolis to go back to The Mall Of America could never be.

The Tenors, for those of you who are not familiar with them, are an extremely gifted quartet of young men who are - big surprise - all tenors! They sing a mix of classical, opera and crossover classipop songs. They were originally called The Canadian Tenors, but changed their name to more accurately reflect their international popularity. They perform everything from classic tenor arias like "Nessun Dorma" to a cover of  Bob Dylan's "Forever Young."

Our excitement proved to be short-lived, though, when the concert was postponed, and ultimately canceled, due to an ongoing labor dispute between the Minnesota Orchestra and their musicians.

Our trip was cancelled. We should have expected it, I suppose, since our anniversary plans have often changed due to circumstances out of our control. One year the boys Olympians Club at church was going Christmas Caroling so Diane and I were going out for a nice dinner. Unfortunately some of the volunteer drivers failed to show up so Diane and I spent our anniversary driving groups of elementary school kids around the community.

Another year we actually did get to go out for dinner, but the boys ended up with us. To make it even more strange, our waitress apparently quit and walked out of the restaurant after taking our order but before submitting it to the kitchen. I finally went to the owner at the front desk to check on our dinner when we noticed people who arrived well after us getting their food while we sat with nothing. That is when we learned the waitress had quit and no one knew she had taken off with our order. We ended up with a free dinner, but it was another odd anniversary.

I guess it shouldn't have been a surprise, then, that The Tenors cancelled their concert on our anniversary. Fortunately, though, The Tenors announced a new date in Milwaukee on May 17th. I bought tickets as soon as I heard about the new show and Diane and I prepared to belatedly celebrate our anniversary at the concert. We couldn't wait for the day to arrive and, last night it finally did.

Staged in the historic and beautiful Pabst Theater in downtown, Milwaukee, The Tenors came on stage shortly after the scheduled 7:30 starting time. They performed until 10:00 with only a twenty minute intermission.

The Tenors wowed us with songs from two of their three albums; they didn't do anything solely from their Christmas album. They also did a number of songs that are not on any of their albums; including another Dylan cover of "To Make You Feel My Love" and "Bring Him Home" from Les Miserables.

 It took us five months to celebrate our 25th Anniversary; but what a celebration it was!