Greeting Card Campaign: Marital Bliss Day

Click here to download the card.

Each year on October 11^th, a bunch of us happily married types celebrate Marital Bliss Day.
This holiday probably springs from Gomer's Feast Day. And no we're not talking about THAT Gomer.

It's SAINT Gomer the Confessor, an 8^th century Belgian of royal blood known for his meekness and piety. He was called to France to serve King Pepin and by all accounts was a rarity in a French courtier - an honest, kind and trustworthy man. Pepin liked him so much he hooked him up with a young woman of noble family called Gwinmary. In deference to the king's wishes, Gomer promptly married the girl.  Gwinmary, by all accounts was a trophy wife of the worst sort.  She was a shopaholic with a penchant for blowing through poor Gomer's bank accounts. She apparently thought quite highly of herself, terrorized servants and shopkeepers and possessed an evil and twisted sense of humor. She proved altogether unmanageable for poor Gomer. He'd go off on a trip with the king and come back to find the house a shambles and every neighbor and merchant within ten miles either threatening to file a lawsuit or take a club to the woman. Gomer’s life became a long series of trials and tribulations, and even though he loved her dearly, he was eventually driven to take refuge in a monastery where he lived out his life in solitude, religious service and, apparently, hard work. As long as he lived he sent money back to Paris to take care of his termagant of a wife and her layabout relatives.

For his troubles, Gomer was posthumously promoted to sainthood as the patron saint of cowherds, woodcutters, the poor and hard-pressed. St. Gomer, however, is chiefly known as the patron saint of the miserably married. As humorist Erma Bombeck once noted. "Marriage has no guarantees. If that's what you're looking for, go live with a car battery."

But for those fortunate enough to live with a non-evil love of our life, it is best not to mention the unhappy origins of this holiday.  Instead send a nice, sweet card to your lady-love and let her know how much you appreciate it that she doesn't make you miserable.

Just click on the caption below the picture of the married couple at the top left.  The link will take you to a pdf file in Google Docs. Remember, instead of printing from Google Docs, click on "File" in the upper left corner, then select "Download" and copy the file to your own computer.  Open it with Adobe PDF Reader or whatever PDF reader you use and print the card from there. For some reason Google Docs doesn't handle fonts well, even though they are supposed to be embedded in the PDF document itself.

This is a side fold card, so when it prints, be sure to tell your printer it's in "landscape" format so you get the whole file. Flip it on the short side to print double-sided. Much quicker that way.

And when you sign the card, don't just put your name on it. Think really hard about it and say something sweet. After all, you could have wound up with Gwinmary!

© 2013 by Tom King