This is Terry and me the night of her senior prom in 1987.
We were babies.
This Saturday, my wife and I will celebrate our 34th wedding anniversary. I know many couples who have been married longer, but I'm proud (and exceedingly blessed) to have been with Terry that long.
Actually, when it comes to how long we've been together, the real figure is a nice round 40 years. We started dating in March 1986 and have (mostly) never looked back.
Terry and I were talking recently about what we would do if something happened to the other person, and we both said we wouldn't remarry. This is especially believable for Terry, as I think women generally do better than men living on their own in the second half of life. But I also know I'm not helpless and would be fine flying solo if I had to, albeit sad over what I had lost.
I try never to take for granted the fact that when I get home from work, my best friend in the world will be there. Often she will have cooked a delicious meal and will have spent her day taking care of one or more household issues with a skill and grace I could never match.
It's a blessing I neither deserve nor necessarily knew I wanted until I had it.
Because here's the thing about life: You have no idea what's around the corner. You can plan for the proverbial Second Act – and to some extent you should – but no one has ever said you're entitled to a prescribed number of years on this planet or with your significant other.
You could live to be 100, you might get hit by a bus at 50. Who knows?
Only God does. So it's probably wise to enjoy the here and now at every opportunity for as long as you can.
I've given a lot of thought in recent years to when I might retire. If all goes according to plan (and again, it rarely does), I probably have another decade or so in the full-time workforce.
It's a balancing act between the financial math and maximizing the time you have to enjoy your nest egg and focus on things other than your job, bills, young kids, etc.
Our financial guy ran some numbers suggesting I might retire as early as age 62. Depending on market performance, the math does check out, but I'm not sure the intangibles do. I don't know if I'll be ready at that point to move on.
The point is that, however things play out, I have someone at my side with whom I share life's joys, its challenges, its frustrations, and its revelations. We'll celebrate this fact on Saturday with the traditional anniversary dinner somewhere nice, probably followed by an hour on the couch watching "Blindspot," a TV series we both enjoy.
And then it will be off to bed to rest up for another day of whatever comes our way. If that's not the definition of "as good as it gets," I'm not sure what is.
