50 Years and Still Counting

Today marks our 50th wedding anniversary. 

50 years. That's longer than many of the people we know have been alive. We have other friends who have been married even longer than us, but we're in a very tiny group. It's a privilege to have shared a life with someone for so long.

I can't say the early years were easy, but I think it's because of hardships that makes a marriage solid. 

The only thing I know for certain is that for any marriage to work, BOTH partners have to be willing to row in the same direction.

Greg and I met by accident. My best friend in high school had a huge crush on him and forced me (literally forced) me to go with her to watch him play chess. 

Chess! That girl had no pity on me. After a few minutes, she sighed in resignation and told me we could leave. While some of the other guys in the room made conversation with us, he did not. Obviously he wasn't interested. I went to my after school job and didn't give it another thought.

Fate is a funny thing though. It kept throwing Greg and me together in the unlikeliest places. He was two grades ahead of me so we had no reason to cross paths, but for some reason we kept running into each other in this huge city. He swore he didn't do it on purpose, and certainly neither did I. We just kept bumping into each other. 

It started with small talk and witty repartee, but it was only after we got on the subject of science that he really piqued my interest. We would talk for hours about space travel and rocketry.  

And then he took me to see 2001: A Space Odyssey. We lost track of time, discussing and debating the story's technical aspects.

We became inseparable, much to the chagrin of his girl "friends" who secretly had crushes of their own. My own friend took it on the chin. She could see the chemistry grow between me and Greg. While she liked him for his looks and charm, I liked him (additionally) for his smarts. It was the first time a guy ever talked to me without talking down to me. We were equals--a big deal back in those days.

Greg left for college the following year to study space science at the Florida Institute of Technology. Without him around, I finished school and all my free time was spent working and saving money. We wrote each other weekly, but I honestly didn't think we'd ever get back together, and I was preparing myself for when he was ready to break up.

Instead, he came home. He had planned on continuing his education in Chicago, but the Florida school worked on the trimester system, and the universities in Chicago worked on semesters. His grades wouldn't transfer! It was ridiculous, but there was no fighting it. The school registrar told him, he'd have to start over.

He was justifiably angry and stormed out of the office. As he made his way home, he knew he had to do something. His father wasn't about to let him take the year off and he'd already missed the deadline to go back to university in Florida, so he bought a newspaper and started searching the want ads. He figured he'd get a job in the interim so he could make a plan on what to do next. 

In all our wildest dreams, we never knew the next thing would be Texas!

He hadn't been at his job long when they told him they were relocating the chemical plant to Texas, and invited him to go. They even paid to fly him (and me) to Southeast Texas to see if we'd like it. 

We weren't married yet. The topic hadn't even come up. I was content with the way things were because I was about to sign a lease on my very first apartment. The news that I might lose him again, this time for good, was a make or break moment. 

I struggled with my options, but in the end, I figured we were young and had nothing, so what did we have to lose? If Texas turned out to be a dud, we could just go back and start over.

A few weeks later, he proposed to me in the parking lot of McDonalds. The rest was 50 more years of history.

Happy anniversary to my better half! Thank you for the adventure.

We did all right.

 

My question to you: How long have you been married? Did your married life turn out the way you expected?

 

 

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