Brad Hall: HALL THINGS CONSIDERED: Happy 10th anniversary to my wife!

Sep. 22—Today, September 22, 2022, just so happens to be a special day for my wife and I.

It was on this date in 2012 that Carmen and I were united in marriage at Hopewell Baptist Church in Corbin.

I was planning to dedicate this column to this occasion anyway, but once I realized that today's newspaper also fell on this exact day, I knew I absolutely had to write about it.

In 2009, I moved here to Corbin to take this job, having never even been to Corbin before. Then just two years later, I was already engaged to my future wife.

Because of that, it was never any question why God led me here and just further assurance that I was in the right place.

A year after our engagement, we would get married, and were ready to start making and sharing memories as a family.

After our nice honeymoon in Destin, Florida, we got settled into our new house right away. Then the next year we adopted our dog Skipper who recently turned 9 years old.

Over the course of our marriage, we would share many more happy moments with our friends and family.

On Carmen's side, we got to see her brother marry his wife, and we got to see Carmen's mom marry her husband.

We also got to meet the baby girl of Carmen's first cousin who has grown up to be a big girl during this time.

On my side, we were a part of a couple more weddings and births as my oldest sister got married in Michigan, and my other sister got married in California. They've both gone on to start families as well, having daughters of their own.

After all of that, Carmen and I decided it was our turn to start a family, and so we welcomed little Jaxson two years ago in 2020.

In just that little amount of time, we've gotten to share birthdays with him and Christmases with him, and many other occasions with his grandmas and grandpas and aunts and uncles.

It's certainly been a change as we've moved into parenthood but of course we wouldn't trade it for anything.

Outside of these big milestone moments, we've also had lots of other fun and exciting times as a married couple. We've traveled to Michigan and California as I've mentioned, but also to places like Mammoth Cave; Gatlinburg, Tennessee; Savannah, Georgia; Charleston, South Carolina; and Boston, Massachusetts. and of course, we've made many trips around Kentucky visiting my mom's home and my dad's home.

One special tradition we started about a year after we got married was trying a restaurant each month that we had never been to. Our first restaurant was in November 2013, and we've kept the streak going ever since then. We're actually spending our anniversary in Nashville this weekend, so we'll definitely find some new places to try while we're there.

We've also had a few trying times we've had to get through during our 10 years of marriage as well.

Three of my four grandparents passed away since we've been married along with our cat Lexie who died last year. I certainly miss all of them but I was thankful to have Carmen by my side during those difficult situations.

So after 10 years of marriage, I just want to say thank you to Carmen for supporting me all of this time.

I drag her all across the state and country for family gatherings. She also has to deal with my crazy work schedule where I'm gone all day and night.

But through it all, she's still been the best wife to me and the best mom to Jaxson. She's always been an inspiration to me as well by the way she puts her faith in God and the way she lives her life.

I've truly been blessed to be her husband for 10 years and, if the Lord is willing, hopefully we're just getting started.

Ephesians 4:2-3 says, "With all lowliness and meekness, with longsuffering, forbearing one another in love; Endeavouring to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace."

Thank you so much for everything this past decade, Carmen. It means the world to me, and I love you very much. Happy 10th Anniversary!

Brad Hall is the nighttime editor at the Times-Tribune. He can be contacted at bhall@thetimestribune.com.