Forty Years

Bill and I celebrated our fortieth wedding anniversary yesterday. Forty years! Man, that's a long time to live with the same person, isn't it? In California, it's almost unheard of. We're a dying breed. It's few and far between. Down here in Arizona, at least in this little town, it's a ho-hum done-deal. A few weeks ago at Sally's Beauty Shop when I stopped in to get my hair cut and announced we were having our fortieth anniversary, the hairdresser patted me on the shoulder and said she and her husband were having their forty-sixth this year. Then, that "that gal over there is celebrating her forty-fourth", and somebody else under the drier was fixing to celebrate her fiftieth. So, I guess it just depends where you're coming from if it's an odd occurrence or not.

But forty years? Well, pardon me, but I'm going to pat Bill and me on the back right now for sticking with each other for that long, okay? Forty years ago, Bill married a naive little eighteen-year-old who knew practically nothing about anything. He, himself, was a precocious, (sometimes) swaggering young man who would say "No!" to nothing. Bring it on! And what he didn't know he'd find out while he was learning it, thank you. We've both weathered and tempered and settled down and learned a lot in the intervening forty years. Thank you, God! that we're not the same people we were forty years ago. But part of the recreating ourselves every few years with a new hobby or interest has what's held us together and made our union so happy and long lived.

At first, it was fishing. Then we moved on to when he was a pilot and we flew to Mexico for fishing and diving vacations in his small plane. Next it was scuba diving for both of us and we experienced some wonderful underwater vacations all around the world. We morphed that into underwater photography, stills for me and videos for him and learned lots more on the computer and how to put on slide shows and make videos. Harleys came into the next phase of our interest and again, more adventures and more trips. So, Fun just keeps on coming. Right now, we've added golf (I believe there's a law some place that says you gotta play golf if you live in Arizona or Florida or Hawaii, isn't there?). And I would never say there won't be more new hobbies or interests somewhere in our future, since I am married to the man who just keeps re-creating himself.

We celebrated with a nice little family party here in Superior. It was a foul day, by Arizona standards, on Sunday. It rained three inches and was dark and chill. But my folks came up from Casa Grande with Al and Gloria. Brother Tom arrived from Apache Junction. We barbecued ribs and steaks in the garage and served some chilled Mexican shrimp. I made Bill's favorite dessert from forty years ago, a Refrigerator Chocolate Angel Cake with chocolate whipped cream. Since it was so cold outside, Bill lit a fire in our fireplace and we sat around and enjoyed the warmth all afternoon.

No, maybe it wasn't the most wildly exciting celebrations we've ever had. (Our twenty-ninth was on the beach at a table overlooking the rocks at the finesterra [end of the world] in Cabo San Lucas. And when the young waiter heard we were celebrating that venerable of a number, he beseeched Bill, "Pleeze, sir! How you stay weez de same woman for dat long? I only have my wife fo' fo' year and dat too long!") But this anniversary was definitely one of the Best Ones in all of the forty.

As my dad left, he gave me a hug and said, "Nancy, I'll be around to help you celebrate your eightieth!" and I just bet he will!