Happy Anniversary to a pair of crazy love birds who have weathered all things together! Keely recounts her parent’s incredible journey through a lifetime together… and still very much in love.

My parents are crazy.

They married thirty seven years ago, and dated for a few years prior. My Dad was twenty two, and my Mom twenty one. To my generation, that’s like getting hitched in the fifth grade. (Personally, I had nothing remotely adult or emotional worth offering up at twenty one. Probably not even at twenty five. Questionably at thirty.)

He was a guitarist. What was she thinking? Musicians aren’t relationship material! And she even toured around with his band for awhile. I think we’ve all seen this VH1: Behind The Music. But instead of having a tumultuous breakup in Cleveland… he married her. (In Boston.) They had a small living room ceremony where he, having donned a plaid sport coat and she, clad in a navy gown with orange flowers, promised to love, honor and always think each other looked as fabulous as that very day.

Eventually he left the band and built her a home on Cape Cod. After a few years of playing house like the juveniles that they were, they had my older sister. And then me.

Things were going so well that they decided to up and move to Western Massachusetts. (Another sign that they were nuts- who willingly leaves the Cape?) And then to throw another wrench into their supposed sanity, they decided to have another baby. In fact, twins. Two more girls.

That’s where their love story ends, right? Nope. He just made that house bigger. And succeeded in peacefully living among five women, even if he never quite managed a proper ponytail. My Mom, for her part, ran a tight ship of a home – one impossibly full of food, love and loud voices.

Then came the Big Whammy O’ Crazy – they opened a restaurant together. (To those uninitiated, this is an undertaking made only if one desires to never again converse with one’s spouse.) But it succeeded for a decade and change, and miraculously, so did their relationship. Maybe it even made it stronger, since there are few better marriage salves than shared stories of insane customers and overpriced produce.

They’ve gotten to bankroll four college tuitions and (as of yet) two weddings. Plus eighty family vacations and four thousand “necessary” items along the way. (Nothing acts as an aphrodisiac quite like dollar bills flying out the window on teensy tiny wings.)

Along the way there have even been opportunities for trips for the two of them alone. You know, to remember if they still dug each other as a couple. Turns out, they do.

They’re still each other’s “one,” despite a crush of people and events impeding any time to say that phrase aloud. But words aren’t really necessary when you know that someone’s still your biggest fan – musically, creatively, personally.

It’s said that we’re fated to be like our parents. That’s the craziest thing of all. But here’s hoping.