"Thanks for taking the afternoon off to marry me," he said.

"Did you call L. back?" "Shit! I forgot," I said, replaying his message, which ended, "...and Val, I just have a question for you." As I dialed, I wondered if the question was "Are you ready for another dog yet?"

"Hey, it's Val. Sorry I didn't call earlier..." I braced for a funny yet caustic comment, but he said, a little subdued, or nervous, "That's OK. Hey, school's out, right?" "Yes, thank God!" "Oh, good," he seemed relieved. "Well," he continued, a familiar bitchy tone creeping into his voice, "since I know you don't have any plans for tomorrow - other than eating bon-bons and screwing the gardener, that is - do you want to go to Fairfield?" I wasn't offended, nor should you be, neither of those things were in my plan for today. In fact, he knows I prefer salty to sweet...but, come to think of it, I am a little miffed that he'd even joke that I would resort to behavior that's as conventional a cliché as screwing my non-existent gardener.

"Fairfield?" I asked. "Yes...would you like to be our witness?" Two beats later I shattered my silence and his eardrum with an embarrassingly girly squeal. "Great, we'll pick you up at 12:30..." "No, 12:00," I heard R. in the background. L. continued, "OK, 12:00. We have to be at the courthouse by 12:30, then we'll take you to lunch at Mimi's, then we'll stop at Home Depot if R. doesn't have to get right back to work..."



Only these two would have "Get married" on their list of errands to run on a Friday afternoon. Their down-to-earth, no-nonsense way of relating (among other things) has made possible their 26-years together. They so clearly value each other, yet have never taken themselves or their relationship overly seriously. This couple is a model of how to effectively mix tolerance, (com)passion, realism, annoyance, humor, independence, several hobbies and a small zoo and still stay together. Here's to 26 more years!