At a party marking the festive occasion, a friend of the bride passed around a yellowed clipping from a Boston newspaper published in the summer of 1956. It showed my brother John and his new wife Mary Rose as a fresh-faced just-married couple in their middle 20s.

Now, by contrast, they show the facial lines of their mid 70s, signs of lives vigorously and generously lived. Other photos from the intervening years display the two at various stages of development─early adulthood, middle years, and now early old age.

Such graphic portrayals of aging never fail to transfix my attention. They always set me to reflect on human change with its combination of surprise and slow but relentless advance. Can those smooth young faces belong to the same human beings as those now displayed with their wisened (if not wizened) countenances of today?

The party, held under a large tent in the Cape Cod town where they have lived since 1960 (?), was an affirmation of family bonds. The seven adult children of Mary Rose and John were all present and in festive mood as they orchestrated their parents’ 50th wedding anniversary celebration and their father’s 75th birthday.

In the climax of this party ritual, each of the sons and daughters came forth in turn to regale us all with anecdotes about their parents, stories that were culled from the children’s growing-up years. Chosen for their humorous qualities, these tales evoked sometimes boisterous laughter from honorands and guests alike.

One of the boys recalled, for instance, discovering that the new babysitters were nudists. A daughter remembered that, like many children, she was sent to bed early when her parents entertained adult friends. This little girl had discovered a floorboard that was loose, allowing her to eavesdrop on the conversation in the living room below.

Such anecdotes, not always startling in themselves, take their value from the ties of a strong family. That is what emerged most vividly from the occasion: the love and respect of former children, now adults, for their parents.

And this was clearly what John and Mary Rose most valued in the celebration. They felt themselves appreciated not merely for all that they had done for their children but for who they themselves are recognized to be.

Seeing three generations of extended family members together in one place renewed my respect for the strength in family ties. I was impressed once again by how the younger members of our extended family value their relationships with aunts and uncles, cousins and in-laws, and even the friends of their relatives.

Clearly, they have learned from growing up in this family atmosphere how much it counts to have a family. My daughter Emily does not need to be taught what inner and outer security she derives from being bound to relatives who care about her. Nor do the grandchildren of my brother John and sister-in-law Mary Rose require instruction about what it means to be related.

The photos I took on this occasion witness to the joy felt by virtually everyone at being together in celebration of two principal members of the extended family. It wasn’t just the lobster and the clam chowder, along with wine and other drinks, that put us in festive mood. We felt high because of the human achievement of creating and fostering rich family relationships.

Both Mary Rose and John are subject to some of the physical disabilities of later life. But, like so many others among their age peers, they live vibrantly in what is mistakenly called retirement.

They spend much of their time kin-keeping, serving as active resources for family members. Generously, they give help and other assistance to those within the extended family and elsewhere to those who can benefit from them.

As the oldest member of my parental family, I now feel myself to be leading the way into old age. Whether my three brothers and two sisters look to me for any kind of guidance on this sometimes perilous journey I do not know. But I take it as a privilege to have received the gift of longevity and intend to use it for others, when appropriate.

I count it as a special blessing to be on good terms with all the members of my extended family. With every one of them I can talk and exchange views. But, as the decibel level when we get together attests, we do not agree on everything. Even on politics and religion, we have been known to argue.

The gathering for John and Mary Rose’s fiftieth highlights both their love and the love that abounds among those related to them. Without sentimentalizing human weaknesses, I will continue to celebrate the ties that bind us together in a family. Only two of our family members can as yet observe the 50th anniversary of marriage, but we are united in praising it as an ideal.

Richard Griffin