I have a weird quirk sometimes when it comes to dates.
I think it’s one I shared with President George H.W. Bush. I seem to recall during one of his presidential campaigns he said something about it being the anniversary of the attack on Pearl Harbor when it was actually September 7th rather than December 7th.,
I had the same thing happen to me once when I mentioned in a notes column that it was my dad’s birthday. The column appeared on May 3rd and his actual birthday was February 3rd.
I mention it because something similar happened to me yesterday. It was October 19th and for some reason I kept thinking it was an anniversary of my long-ago first wedding.
And I do mean long ago. That first wedding — the one that didn’t take — happened in 1975, but it happened on April 19th. So yesterday would actually have been a half-anniversary that would have marked 46 1/2 years. Since we were actually together less than five years, the comparison is sort of overwhelming.
One thing I have come to realize is that the strangest thing about aging isn’t your actual age, but instead it’s thinking of how long ago things that were important to you happened.
I have an old friend — actually my first real girlfriend — who was a big part of my life when I was 20 and she was 18.
She just celebrated her 70th birthday, although from my own experience I wonder if people really celebrate that far along unless they’re happy just to be alive. She may have a way to go. Both her parents are still alive in their mid 90s.
But what stuns me in thinking about it is that we broke up 51 years ago last month.
Half a century.
I have friendships that go back as far as 58 years. Of course I have four relationships that go back 60 years or longer — my four younger siblings.
I have a female friend I met in the fall of 1979 and dated for most of 1980 and 1981. A nine-year difference in our ages and the resulting difference in career stages probably did us in, but we both got married to other people in the early ’90s and are still friends. It’s actually sort of strange that the only important woman in my life that I have no contact with and very little knowledge of is my first wife.
In April it will be 40 years since we saw or spoke to each other. I know she has had two other failed marriages, although the fact that her third husband died might mean I’m being too tough on her.
I hope it’s not being too ungracious to brag that my second marriage took. In fact, 12 days from today will be my 29th wedding anniversary.
What’s the point of all this?
Big numbers.
I have been an adult for more than half a century, and if I’ve learned anything it’s that the only real meaning in my life is what happiness I have been able to bring to others.
I have a wife who loves me and two children who are having wonderful, successful lives.
Six grandchildren who bring me nothing but happiness and two nephews who fill me with pride.
Those are the only numbers that matter.