Diamond couple sails away

By Kath Gannaway
YARRA Glen couple Phillip and Marion Simpson will be sailing off to the South Pacific very soon with carefree minds.
The cruise is a gift from their five daughters to celebrate their 60th wedding anniversary, but with the February bushfires coming within just metres of their home, Marion said they were initially apprehensive about leaving.
Recent rains have put a damper on their concerns and they can now sail away without so much as a backward glance.
Marion and Phillip were married in Edinburgh, Scotland on 23 March 1949, and both recall times were still tough in those post-war years.
Phillip was just out of the Merchant Navy having done his bit for the war effort and many things, including wedding dress materials, were still rationed.
The Simpson family – mum, dad and the five girls – arrived in Australia in July 1967. They say life’s been good, but not necessarily easy. Both worked two jobs to make ends meet and to get ahead.
For 30 years their shared passion was restoring and showing antique horse carriages. Their beautiful carriages, immaculately groomed horses, with the equally immaculately groomed Marion at the reins, were a feature of the annual Yarra Glen Show and many others around the country.
They have moved on to a different sort of horsepower these days travelling around the countryside in a much-polished 1929 Dodge Victory 6 – complete with kookaburra bonnet decoration!
They are members of several motoring clubs and say spending time together on projects they love has played a big part in 60 happy years of marriage.
Of course their other shared passion is their lovely daughters, 17 grandchildren and 17 great grandchildren – soon to be 18.
Give and take, they both agree is an important ingredient in the happy marriage recipe, with a good dollop of being prepared to say sorry and more than the occasional pinch of not holding unrealistic expectations in the first place that there will never be a cross word.