A man and woman were celebrating their golden 50th wedding anniversary. Many people showed up to congratulate them, and wish them well. During the party, somebody happened to comment, “How did they ever manage to stay together for so long? What do you think their secret is?”
A neighbor and good friend of the old couple said, “Ah, well, that’s no secret, I can tell you how they did it.”
With that, the old timer told the group a story about when the man and woman were first married. The story goes as follows.
The man and woman were driving home from their wedding, in a horse drawn carriage. As part of the wedding gift and her dowry, the couple had a brand new carriage with a young, strong, beautiful horse to pull their carriage. Along the way, the horse happened to stumble slightly over a rock. The husband, who was of course just a young man at that point, said loudly “That’s once!”
The wife, who was at that point in history a beautiful young woman, was completely confused, and didn’t understand what her new husband meant, but figured that instead of asking, she’d just see if it was a peculiar habit or something of his. About half way home, the horse stumbled again, this time over a small hole in the road. The man immediately said, in a stern harsh warning voice, “That’s twice!”
The woman was a little concerned now, because she didn’t know why her husband was getting upset, but she decided to wait and see.
As they were almost home, coming in through the front gate, the horse stumbled for a third time. The husband immediately stopped the carriage, stood up, and without another word pulled out a gun, and shot the horse dead between the eyes.
At this point the young woman couldn’t contain herself. She yelled out “What is wrong with you, are you crazy? Why did you shoot that horse?”
The young man just calmly looked at his new bride, and quietly but firmly said. “That’s once…”