Matt Gentry | The Roanoke Times

Jim Garrison, 95, and Ruth Garrison, 90, are celebrating their 70th anniversary today. They met in 1936 when Jim Garrison traveled from his home near Charlottesville to attend church with his sister in Ashland.

CHRISTIANSBURG -- Four kisses on the way out the door, an "I love you" before bedtime and more than a few refrains of "I'm sorry."

These, according to a Christiansburg couple celebrating their 70th wedding anniversary today, are the ingredients for a long-lasting marriage.

Ruth Garrison, 90, and Jim Garrison, 95, met in 1936, when the latter traveled from his home near Charlottesville to attend church with his sister in Ashland. The family invited Ruth Garrison to lunch afterward. After that, Jim Garrison kept showing up in Ashland.

It was no coincidence.

"I tried to find something I didn't like [about Ruth], but that was hard to do," he said, breaking into a sly grin. The couple sat on their living room couch Monday, holding hands and giggling.

Two months ago, Jim Garrison lost his wedding band down the sink and Ruth Garrison visited a jeweler to have it replaced.

Matt Gentry | The Roanoke Times

Jim and Ruth Garrison, who celebrate their 70th wedding anniversary today, display their 1938 wedding certificate in their Christiansburg home.

"The jeweler said he couldn't believe anybody married 70 years was still looking for one," she said.

Together, the Garrisons cared for their elderly parents and watched their children, Jim Garrison and Nina Clopton, grow up to have children, who then had children. They lived around Charlottesville for most of their married lives, until they moved to Christiansburg one and a half years ago to be near their son.

Jim Garrison worked 60 years for Charlottesville Oil Co. and continued to work part time for the company until he was 93. His wife was a stay-at-home mom and homemaker. The couple attended University Baptist Church in Charlottesville, where Ruth Garrison said they felt like the "grandparents of the whole church."

"We were there so long that we saw children grow up from little ones to being parents and grandparents," she said. In fact, students in the church's second- and third-grade Sunday school class sent them anniversary cards this year.

The Garrisons' family hosted an anniversary party this weekend, and the congregation of their new church, Cambria Baptist, threw them a party Sunday. The Garrisons expect that they'll celebrate in a more low-key way today.

The couple couldn't specify what they like to do together because they typically do everything together.

"They can finish each other's sentences," Clopton said.

Ruth Garrison said she's grateful and blessed.

"We're so grateful that we're still here and that we have each other," she said. "I'm grateful that he thinks I'm still special."