5 years

Yesterday my husband and I celebrated 5 years of marriage.

I never in a million years could have imagined all the things God had in store for us for our first 5 years but I wouldn't change a single thing.  I am so confident that He placed Jason in my life for very specific reasons and there is no one I'd rather share this journey with.  I'm so blessed to have married my best friend!

photo courtesy of Loft3

We decided to celebrate our anniversary by doing what we did on our first date, rock climbing.  We had planned to take the train and knew we wouldn't be driving for a few hours so we stopped by a liquor store near the station that offers free umeshu {plum liquor} samples.  I am not a big drinker but I love umeshu and I'd been wanting to stop by this place for a while but never thought about it until I was driving past and then it wasn't really an option.  So we went in on our way to the station, tried a few varieties and bought a few bottles to add to our bar.

When we arrived at the train station we noticed that a train was stopped in between stations, something we rarely, if ever, see.  We knew immediately that something wasn't right so I took a photo.

 Then we noticed a station employee walking along the tracks, something else that I've never seen before, so again, I took a photo.

  He picked up a shoe and I thought, "oops, someone lost a shoe"...then I realized that the person who lost the shoe was UNDER THE TRAIN!  Unfortunately train suicides are a fairly common occurrence here in Japan.  We have no idea if this was a suicide or an accident {we're inclined to believe it was an accident because the man appeared to be with a woman when this happened and majority of suicide cases happen when the person is alone} but it was completely surreal to witness either way.  We couldn't help but stand around for a few minutes with the crowd to see what happened but after a short while we decided it was best to leave.  When we left the emergency responders were just arriving and the man was still alive.  From what I understand, unlike in America, the Japanese tend to down play these incidents.  There are no media crews rushing to the scene and I don't even know if there will be a report in the local newspaper.  I pray that the man is alive and makes a full recovery and if it was a suicide attempt, he gets the mental help he needs. 

After that I was pretty shook up so we decided to just head home.  Jason bought me a gorgeous bouquet of flowers which brightened my mood just a tad.

We went out and had a delicious dinner at a French restaurant near by that evening

The food was rich and cheesy and buttery and SO good!

It was definitely not the day we had envisioned but in the end we were together and that's all that matters, especially in this military lifestyle. This will certainly be an anniversary we will never forget.