Promises kept: Gastonia couple celebrates 76 years of marriage

In their 1986 hit song called "Grandpa," written by Steven Hinkle, the Judds sang these questions for a wise grandfather:

Did lovers really fall in love to stay?

And stand by each other come what may?

Was a promise really something people kept?

Not just something they would say?

Did families really bow their heads to pray?

Did daddies really never go away?

The life we are living now is different from the lives of those in prior generations. There are more inputs, outputs, clutter, considerations, stuff. The pace of life is fast.

Relationships are founded and sustained based more on what people do than on who they are. Perhaps every generation looks at those who follow and determines they are less — less disciplined; less genuine; less committed to values that matter.

I know a man and woman named Roland and Faye Lanier. They have been married to one another for 76 years. Seventy-six years! Can you imagine? And how? By the power of love and commitment and integrity and a simple determination to stay together and to love one another until death separates them.

They were married on Dec. 27, 1945, just months after the end of a war that left 65-million people dead, and economies shattered across the world.

Roland was a sailor assigned to the U.S.S. Stafford, a destroyer escort commissioned in 1943. He was aboard the ship for the commissioning ceremony, for its initial cruise from Texas to the Bahamas to test all systems in open waters and he was even in attendance when the ship was decommissioned after the war.

He sailed aboard the Stafford with his fellow seamen through the Panama Canal to the Pacific and to war with Japan serving as combat escort to aircraft carriers and other large vessels. Attacked by Japanese kamikazes near the end of the war, the Stafford was nearly sunk, but managed to stay afloat and limp to harbor for repairs.

In the nearby photograph taken last year at their 75th wedding anniversary party they are holding their wedding picture. Faye is young and beautiful in her wedding dress. Roland is happy and proud wearing the uniform of the U.S. Navy.

They have lived in quiet dignity in the same house since 1959 near the intersection of Franklin Boulevard and Cox Road; still independent; still capable of taking care of themselves and each other at the ages of 96 and 97. Their lives answer the questions in the song quoted above: yes, a man and a woman can fall in love and stand beside one another for a lifetime; and, yes, fathers can stay with their wives and children.

Together they built a solid foundation on which future generations now stand; two sons, Vann and David, an engineer and a banker with good wives, Sharon and Lucy. Together Roland and Faye can celebrate grandchildren, and great-grandchildren and mourn family losses when tragedy strikes, still strong enough to recover, to smile, to laugh and to love as sorrow fades.

I recently stood in their den holding a cake Faye had baked for my family. In a corner Faye proudly showed me the tablet computer they use to Facetime with their granddaughter, Chrissy and her husband, Wes and two great-grandchildren, Sarah and Rachel, and with their grandson Matthew. The conversation turned to David, who joined the family at the age of 12 when Vann and Sharon were married.

We are quiet for a second as we absorb his recent loss; but we soon talk about Public Service where Roland worked in accounting for 40 years. We remember West Avenue Presbyterian Church and the homeless ministries where we worked together. Our conversation continues as we talk about the ebb and flow of the lives we have shared in a common community with so many people of good will.

Carla and I recently celebrated our 55th wedding anniversary. She commented to a friend that she remembered how her grandfather, who lived to be 102, shifted over time from expressing his age as a matter of fact to one of pride. We seem to have made that transition relating to the years we have been married, now a matter of pride.

But 76 years? Wow! That really is something. Congratulations Roland and Faye, dear friends we love and thank you for the example you have set for us all.

Michael K. McMahan is a resident of Gastonia.

This article originally appeared on The Gaston Gazette: Gastonia NC couple celebrates 76 years of marriage