Photo: the fruit of 40 years

The same man has walked this path with me for 14,600 nights and days. Well, 14,609 counting February 29s. Today is officially our 40^th anniversary. (Yup. I was a teenage bride.)

He’s amazing.

Who can possibly try to comprehend how the person they vow to be faithful to will change and grow in 40 years? Who can see the person they will become themselves?

We’ve both changed.

At times when one of us was moving faster than the other on this road the one lagging behind (let’s face it, the most comfortable one) started shouting, “Change back! This is messing things up!”

I think sometimes we’re like those roller derby guys who fling a fellow team member forward every once in a while. We do take turns, alternating the shoving of each other ahead –and sometimes we resort to dragging each other kicking and screaming into a new paradigm. But we do eventually walk side by side again. I think it has been a fruitful partnership.

I have not been an easy woman to live with. My man loves order and routine. A calendar with all the squares filled in is my idea of being stuck in a box — with the lid nailed down.

He deals with numbers and loves mathematical puzzles with tidy right-or-wrong answers at the bottom of the page. Not only do I not remember the seven times table, but I can’t even remember what I did with my calculator. Some of his greatest professional discoveries have come about as a result of trying to fix me.

He bases his decisions on solid, empirical, evidence-based research. I sail on symbolism and intuitive hunches.

He is mostly left-brained. I am mostly right…  I am also mostly right-brained.

But even though I have a totally alien way of thinking, he keeps trying to understand me.

He has been faithful though. In forty years I have never for a moment doubted his love. He has been there through the really horrible years when I couldn’t stand to be with myself. More importantly he has been there in the good years when I have had good things to share and he rejoices with me.

Best of all he loves God, and he knows God loves him, so he can afford to be a giver. There’s always more where that came from.

I love you, my man, more than I did on that hot innocent September afternoon 40 years ago. You’re a keeper.