My wish for you

Forty years ago on this night I was laying in bed trying unsuccessfully to sleep. In addition to me, my soon-to-be in-laws' house was full of overnight guests crashing on every available sleeping surface in preparation for the wedding the following day. My wedding. I was 18, Tim was 19 and we were embarking on an adventure the likes of which we couldn't even imagine. We'd been best friends for three years by then, a friendship cultivated by hours of talking while driving through the countryside in his parents' wood-paneled station wagon powered by fifty cent per gallon gasoline.

The years after the wedding weren't always kind, but the friendship persisted. Moves to Wichita Kansas, Bentleyville Pennsylvania, Washington Pennsylvania, Kingman Arizona, St. Charles Missouri and St. Louis Missouri followed, mostly prompted by the ever-changing aviation job market. Cars, planes and motorcycles came and went, some more dramatically than others. Children came, pets wandered in, pets wandered out, children wandered out and back in. We survived a critical car accident, loss of family members, losses of multiple jobs, political and religious ideology shifts and cancer scares. Grandchildren came and brought smiles and laughter. The friendship persisted.

One day I had a dream to go sailing and live on a boat. He never even batted an eye. Friends do that, encourage one another's dreams and do whatever is necessary to facilitate their realization, and here we are, sitting on beautiful crystal-clear Bahamian water in a well-founded sailing yacht celebrating our fortieth anniversary. Someone asked me the other day on Facebook what our secret was. It's simple. We're best friends first, husband and wife second. We genuinely like each other and would rather spend time with each other than anybody else. So this anniversary, I'd like to offer you a gift, my wish for you that you find a friendship as deep and fulfilling as the one we celebrate tomorrow. Happy Anniversary, to my best friend and a wish for forty more.