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We have been married for over twenty years. Each year we try to do something special for our anniversary to celebrate that we have survived another year of working on our marriage vows. Our celebration often includes an overnight in the city where we spent our honeymoon. We also exchange anniversary presents. Through the years it has become more difficult to come up with new and creative ideas for anniversary presents.

Five years ago we discussed that we should purchase something for our home instead of buying individual anniversary presents. We had moved to a different house and needed several things. We decided that we would purchase a new lamp table as well as a new chair. We spent an afternoon picking out the items and then went out for a special dinner to celebrate the anniversary. This seemed like a good idea so we did the same thing the next year. We were shopping in the city of our honeymoon and came across a very unique painting. We decided that the colors would look great in our living room. The painting would take the place of anniversary presents. This was an original art work created by a local artist. The owner of the art gallery told us that the artist was going to be at the gallery the next day if we would want to meet him. The painting was already signed by the artist, but we thought it would be nice to be able to say that we had met the artist. We made arrangements to come back to the gallery the next day.

That evening we went to one of our favorite restaurants to have dinner. We ordered a bottle of champagne and told the waitress that we were celebrating our anniversary. We were enjoying our leisurely dinner and we also danced a few dances on the small dance floor that connected to the dinning room. When we were ready to leave we asked for our check. The waitress informed us that the bill had been taken care of by a gentleman at the bar. We told her that there must be some mistake that we did not know anyone in town. She stated that the gentleman had asked what we were celebrating with the champagne and stated that he wanted to pay our bill. She pointed him out to us. We walked up to the middle aged man in the bar to express our gratitude. He was just getting up to leave. He said that he enjoyed watching couples that obviously had a strong relationship and that he sensed this with us. He congratulated us and left.

We were amazed by the stranger’s generosity. We were all shocked the next day when we went back to the art gallery and discovered that the artist of our new purchase was the man that had bought our dinner. It seems we were drawn to his talent the same as he was drawn to our relationship. We explained about buying things for our home in place of anniversary presents. We have kept in contact with him through the years and have developed a great friendship.

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