Fifty years in a flash.
I remember that night as if it were yesterday. I had lost my voice — probably from listening too much— when I met a beautiful, diminutive and demonstrably dynamic woman named Rachel Smith.
It was at a wedding, the social event of the season in an earlier Las Vegas, when Rachel grabbed my hand and gushed those glorious words that define all weddings in our tradition, “Come, I want you to meet my daughter.”
Perhaps because I had no voice and could not talk back even if I had wanted to — a prerequisite for a Jewish husband — or perhaps it was because of my dashingly good looks and charismatic charm, something had convinced the mother that I was just right for the daughter. I am going with the inability to talk thing.
So, I met Myra. And much to Rachel’s great delight, my great surprise and at times during the past 50 years, Myra’s great chagrin, we were married in another social event of the season in Phoenix, Ariz., late the following year.
Since we were from Las Vegas, the betting on the duration of our marriage heavily favored the under. As for me, I wasn’t thinking about half a century into the future. It was more like, “How do I finish law school and my commitment to Uncle Sam’s Army” that would soon follow.
As for Myra, I haven’t a clue what she could have been thinking! By the way, not a whole lot in that regard has changed over the decades.
Myra still has her mother’s gorgeous good looks and uncompromising sense of style and grace and good manners. I inherited from her father, Arnold Smith, his incredibly bad hearing, which I am certain is a key ingredient for a long marriage.
Sure, there have been a few rocks in the road we have taken in our marriage and the life we have built together over the past five decades. Actually, compared to most people, they are just a few pebbles designed to test the path of compromise that is required for all good and lasting partnerships.
And speaking of partnerships, and notwithstanding Nevada being a community property state, I will give credit where it is due. Myra has been the senior member of this partnership since Day One. She knows who is real and who is really just trying to take advantage. And she tells me. Often. Without surcease.
I look back over the past 50 years and I wish I had listened to her. There, Myra, I said it. You were right and I was wrong!*
I was just lucky.
Lucky enough to have not pulled away from dear Rachel that night so many years ago. Lucky enough to have met Myra and somehow convinced her a few months later that she should go on a first date with me even though I had regained my voice and was capable of saying all kinds of stupid things. It is a talent I had then and continue to have to this day.
And I was lucky that she said yes when I asked her to marry me.
We were married 50 years ago today, and I wouldn’t have traded a minute of it. Myra might have a different thought.
As for the next 50 years? I am taking the over!
Happy anniversary, Myra. I love you.
*For all of you fortunate fellows in a similar position of marriage longevity, feel free to change the names and the facts, just keep the sentiment.
Brian Greenspun is editor, publisher and owner of the Sun.