Two Score and Five Years Ago an Enduring Union Was Formed

My husband and I will celebrate our forty-fifth wedding anniversary this year. It's a marriage made in heaven, but only in the sense that I believe all relationships are pre-destined to happen for the lessons we are here to learn.

I found a perfect Valentine's Day card for my husband at a cafe on First Avenue in Manhattan that said, "You're my everything bagel." It showed a bagel topped with sesame seeds, salt, pepper, garlic and onion. I've never been one to indulge in sentimental cards, but I was comfortable with this one because an everything bagel is a treat if you can handle the garlic and onion.

For his part, my husband no longer buys cards at all. He stopped decades ago, and instead, keeps a collection of greeting cards for every occasion. He re-dates them and presents them to me on the appropriate day. He explains that it is eco-friendly; loaded with sentiment from all the years each card has been given; and he never misses a special day. I'm fine with that and therein lies the key to our relationship: relaxed expectations and acceptance.

Long-term marriages such as ours are in decline if you look at trending divorce statistics and the phenomenon dubbed "gray divorce." USA Today published an article about "Gray Divorce" on January 28, 2024, citing that the divorce rate for people over 55 has doubled since 1990 and tripled for those over sixty-five. Being in our seventies, my husband and I fall into the triple risk category.

I'm intent upon avoiding that divorce statistic. My husband's parents had a gray uncoupling when they separated after more than fifty years. We've seen firsthand that divorce tears up families and destroys finances, no matter at what age. According to the USA Today article, divorce will unavoidably result in a decline of wealth for each party by half.

It's critical for each person in a relationship to decide if there is an issue that's a deal breaker. Annoying habits and watching "Ancient Alien Astronauts" on endless loop are not deal breakers. Innocent idiosyncrasies get a pass for the sake of stability of family, home, companionship and finances.

Substance abuse, physical abuse, fiscal irresponsibility and philandering would be intolerable for me. If you have left someone for one or more of these reasons, or if you have been left when you didn't want your relationship to end, you have my compassion. If you have remained to work things out, it may be because you understand we are all imperfect, evolving human beings.

Our marriage is an enigma. We have a push-pull of sprawling belongings versus a quest for order; an astounding catalog of body noises versus a pursuit of refinement; a propensity for depressing topics versus a desire to feel uplifted. Despite this, the state of our union is strong because, at its foundation, are core values. We have coffee and read the paper in the morning and eat our dinner watching the evening news. World events are viewed through the same lens.

We share a common experience of pop culture. In our younger days, we watched "Saturday Night Live" late at night in real time, back when the cast referred to themselves as the "Not Ready for Prime Time Players." We continue to watch "SNL," only now it is recorded to watch during prime time. We've been laughing together for decades.

Over the years of our marriage, we've nurtured a family and continue to have the common bond of children and grandchildren. Creating a home where our family was raised and continuing to maintain it for the younger generations to come together has taken teamwork. Our house is on a canal, and we worked to rebuild it twice after flooding disasters. We tend to the gardens and feed the birds. I was touched when my son considered a tattoo of our house number on his arm because our home evokes warm memories.

Our household division of labor is fine-tuned after all this time. With our son and daughter no longer under our roof, we obsess about our puppy dog, taking turns walking him. My husband shops and cooks; I clean up the kitchen. I gather the garbage from around the house; he takes it out to the curb.

We've both contributed to our household finances and our retirement. My husband supported me while I developed my professional practice; he retired after twenty-five years with a pension. I eventually sold my practice and added my fund to our retirement. Any time it seemed that one of us was pulling more weight financially than the other, I looked at the ebb and flow of the big picture.

The most important part of our relationship is that we've supported each other's goals. My husband encouraged me to pursue my law career and to follow my writing inspiration because he observes that I'm happiest when writing. I helped him leave a career that became too stressful so he could retrain as a holistic health practitioner. Understanding each other's basic needs has been essential to maintaining a healthy partnership.

Separate interests give us room to breathe as individuals. He volunteers for a sports organization, and I belong to a book club. I go away for a weekend with my friends, and he travels to his college reunion. These interactions outside of our relationship lessen our codependency.

There is one aspect of a marriage that sets it apart from other relationships and that is intimacy. You must have physical interaction. Hold hands, kiss hello and good-bye, and don't be stingy with a back or foot rub. Make time for loving. We bicker and fight and sometimes tell each other we've had enough, but we start fresh each day.

From every vantage point I look at it, I am better off in this marriage than I would be without it. Is it a perfect union? No, but I'll take the everything bagel because the combination works for me.

Linda Goor Nanos is a practicing attorney, author, wife, mother and grandmother. Her writing credits include a memoir "Forty Years of PMS," professional articles and published essays on life lessons. Read More