My Mary makes me laugh. Wipes my tears. Hugs me tight. Watched me succeed. Seen me fail. Kept me strong. My Mary is a promise that I will have a friend forever.”

Stop for moment and think back on your life and try and remember that first moment you felt love inside. Not the physical kind that all young people feel. Although that is important, it is not the kind that helps to build a life time of love. I am talking about love that warms your heart and soul. The kind that when you touch your loved ones hand in the night, you feel a since of comfort. The kind that when you hear a certain song, you remember a special moment when it became your song.

In my case, Mary and I have been married 52 Ç years. I have never questioned, did we love each other. I just knew we did. Maybe even more important she is my friend. Someone who is always there. What did the preacher tell us that day, “For better or worse, richer or poor, in sickness and good health”? I donát remember the part about wiping my feet and lowering the seat. But I am sure he must have said it that first day.

I figured that my first duty was to make her happy, which has not always been easy on my part. But I did get the idea that with, “I do”… I had the right to annoy one person the rest of my life. That was until, Mary gave me that look. Men know that “LOOK.” The “LOOK” has several meanings and men know from birth the meaning of the “LOOK.” There are some men who have chosen to ignore the “LOOK”. It may take being married for a second time to understand the “LOOK.” It is important the men know the “Look” to help preserve the species.

Love makes men do, “Well, let’s just say it, STUPID THINGS.” Especially when we were young. Mostly because that first kind of love was so infused with “TESTOSTERONE”. In non-technical terms, our bodies produced gallons of …“Love Potion #9. “ We hope it works on the girls, but in reality is made us say and sometimes do crazy stupid things. It is called LOVE. Or in our early days “IN HEAT.”

Do you know the inspiration for the first Werewolf book? It was written about a young man experiencing puberty for the first time? He Howled and pawed at the dirt outside his girlfriend’s window. Finally her dad through a silver fork at him to run him off. After that, werewolf’s howled at the moon and were run off at the sign of silver. Testosterone can be very strong when you are seventeen.

Now, it would be unfair of me to say boys are always the howling animal of young love. A very long time ago, and donát tell Mary that I told you this. By chance I met a girl and she innocently asked if I could take her home from the dance. Being the gentleman that I was, at least that night I was. Suddenly as we pulled into her drive way, the moon appeared from behind the clouds. In less than two seconds she turned into the SHE WOLF of North Gate. Good thing I had a silver fork with me that night.

Love in our youth was fun and enjoyable. It was love in the moment and made you think about the next kiss, and first base. And donát even thing home plate earlier in the love season. Early love is all consuming and you can mistake the hold the base call, for “STEAL SECOND.”

As we grow older that unbridled love begins to mature into adulthood, wife, home, kids and job. Love still crosses your mind when you come home, but a diaper that needs changing or your wife looks like Medusa after a bad day at work is a real mood killer. By the time your kids reach their teenage years with hundreds of soccer games and little league games attended, an evening of love is a stolen moment first thing in the morning or that real special moment in the middle of the night. Five minutes later you turn over and fall back to sleep. The only sign it happened was the next morning when your wife gives you that special smile. That’s Love.

Then comes the day when the house goes quiet. Kids have gone off to college or out into the world. It is a time when you return to just the two of you. A time when love can bloom in the middle of the day with no worries that a kid will appear in to the bedroom door, kitchen, living room, pantry, or even opening the door on the back seat of the car.

Love is good at this point. It has become like a fine wine, mellowed and mature into a fine satisfying emotion that warms the soul and heart. If your marriage has made it to this point, you have a special gift and it says you have a friend that understands you are not always perfect, but you try. Although you still forget to wipe your feet and you leave the seat up in the middle of the night.

Then one day in your mail box the sign of maturity has caught up with you. An AARP card shows up. At first you think it is a mistake. Then you look at the name on the card, it is your name. Oh my, I am old, do Viagra pills come with the card? Next comes the AARP magazine. Each month it explains how your life should be at your age. Often there are stories on love in our senior years, and they are not talking about senior class years.

You begin to realize that fifty years ago you did not need a magazine to tell you about love. Although that magazine you found hidden in your neighbors back yard surely gave you some ideas. You didn’t understand, but you knew they were having fun.

Senior magazines explain that love in the golden years can be just as special as the love you found in the back row of the Works Drive-in.

At twenty we believe love is all about sex. But as we grow older, we come to understand that kind of love last only a short time, if you donát lie about your stamina along with your gas mileage. Age gives that wonderful filling of warmth and security knowing the one we love is not a separate person, but part of you and you are part of them. Physical love at any age is great, but with age comes the comfort of knowing what real love is. It is everything in a good relationship.

I like good music, it often makes me think of a life time of love, especially when I hear Nat King Cole sing. “When I fall in Love, it will be forever”, I remember my Mary and the kind of Love we have as we look Through the Lens.