How can a life be defined in 10 column inches?

Resslin' Around, By Casey Ressler

How do you define a life? How would you define your life? One of the more intriguing parts of the paper for me, personally, are the 50- or 60-year wedding anniversary announcements, because there, in about 10 column inches, is the summary of a life.

Reading them, you'll find a life is defined by many different measures.

You can learn about people by their announcements. Some people define their lives by the places they've lived, while others turn to their employment history and accomplishments to define or describe themselves. For some, the accomplishments of the rest of their family is more important than what they did themselves, while for others, the organizations they belong to is deemed most important. A life is a life, but how it's lived makes all the difference.

The announcements are like a highlight reel for a person's life, but often, it's the stuff that's not included in these announcements that truly shape a person

If you have to whittle 50 years down into 10 column inches -- about two-thirds the length of this column -- only the good stuff makes the cut, and a lot of things are simply omitted. Lost is the day-to-day living that really defines a person's life -- or at least the perception of that person by others.

"He farmed for 10 years," an announcement will read, for example. For some people, that's five words that sum up a decade of getting up at 4 a.m. and working tirelessly through to midnight, with a break here and there for lunch and dinner, seven days a week. It doesn't tell you that the person probably couldn't take a single vacation during those 10 years because there were things to tend to, it doesn't mention the hundreds of pairs of leather gloves the person wore out while working with his hands for 10 years, and it doesn't even come close to mention that all that hard work only put food on the table, that the person never even came close to being rich because farming isn't a rich man's game.

I've been married for going on six years now, and I can think of more than 10 column inches of stuff I'd want to include -- and I've got 44 years worth of memories ahead of me still.

I don't know how I'd pare down my life to fit into 10 column inches -- heck, I use 20 inches every Sunday for this column.

In the end though, I guess I'd be one of the people who turn to their families to define them.

Ten inches of what we accomplished as a family means more to me than a mention of an award, where I lived or where I worked.

Those things come and go as time passes, but in the end, family is always there.

Casey Ressler (valleylife@frontiersman.com) is the Valley Life editor. In his 50-year wedding announcement, there will be mention of a 30-inch rainbow trout he caught, should he ever be so fortunate.