Our wedding was in a small Fort Lauderdale clapboard church. We spent all the money we had $150.00; this included my ring from Service Merchandise, the white bridal satin for my homemade dress, a cake, flowers and candles from Publix’s.

The little church did not have a foyer, so I sat in the church van waiting to be told when to come down the aisle, but the heavens opened up unleashing a Florida downpour, so I couldn’t hear my cue! I sat in the van begging God to speak if this was not His will, after all I met Joel two months prior. Finally someone came banging on the door of the van and said, “Come on!”

A Panamanian gentlemen Mr. Palacio gave me away; American Mary Anne my Maid of Honor, an Irishman, Kevin Dunn was Joel’s Best Man. Pastor Louissant from the Second Haitian Baptist Church of Miami came w two vans full of big Haitian ladies w big hats and they filled the church. It was an international wedding, a glimpse of our life to come.

I walked in by candlelight and the plan was for someone to flip on the light switch after the processional, but it never happened. So by candlelight, nothing new for a Haitian, Pastor Louissant married us peering into his French bible. To this day I don’t know what I agreed to, but when he pressed us to our knees the power of heaven came down.

The next day Hispanic women in the neighborhood joyfully assured me that the downpour was a sign from heaven that we would be ecstatically happy; and indeed it was and we are. We both praise God for these 45 years of joys and sorrows together. We are madly in love; somedays we are mad and some days we are in love!

Almighty God joined us together to bless us and privilege us with the call to glorify His great name by love and obedience. We give Him all the praise and all the gratitude for His love in us and through us for each other and the souls of men.