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I remember a dream from years ago.  It was not my usual nightmare of trying to outrun a tidal wave or forgetting how to use my phone in an emergency or being chased by evil men who wanted to hurt me.  This was a dream about love.

In my dream a young woman I didn’t know asked me to make love with her. It was her first time.  In my dream I was also young, though with some familiarity of the process, and I wanted her experience to be supreme, for the first time is the bell that rings in our hearts and minds for the rest of our lives.

Nothing more happened in my dream.  She shyly asked, I considered how I might respond.  Had I remained asleep, this might have been my advice.

When you make love for the first time, choose your time and your partner carefully.  This may take years, or it may take as long as shrugging off your robe.

You must choose so you can throw your whole self into the sea.  You must open your eyes to him and search for his soul.  You must open your eyes and allow her to see your soul, your longing, your enchantment, and your fear.

You must then touch in the way that seems right to you.  Your touch should be gentle and intimate but not invasive, both asking who he is and telling who you are.

You may be silent and focus on who you are, who she is, the feeling and meaning of what you are doing on all levels, physical, emotional and spiritual.  You may focus on being in the moment, or remembering the moment, for memory is our universal scrap book.

You might disturb your solitude with unrestrained screams, and hope that the neighbors or your parents are not at home or have temporarily gone deaf.  Or you may hope they are smiling at your first experience and remembering their own.

Enter fully into yourself and her and your intimacy with nothing held back, as if this is not just the first but also the last time the two of you will ever completely share yourselves while on this earth.  And it is true.  You will never be the same.  She will never be the same.  Should you marry and share the same bed for seventy-five years it will never, and should never, be the same.

Each glance, each touch, each word is for now and for the first time and the last time.  This moment, your body, your soul, your heart should be honored, full and complete in this time and at this place, and with this person you chose who will always be more than you imagined.

And, when you are spent, please laugh.  Share the laughter of your new found familiarity, of your relief that it really happened, of the knowledge in your bones that you experienced something amazing and unique  and it will never happen that same way again.

And finally, before you yield to the temptation to roll over or simply cuddle into sleep, you must open your eyes to her and openly reveal your newly naked soul.

Love,

Alan

Almost one year ago I moved into Sprite’s home. I brought with me five suitcases of stuff, and a lot of unsorted baggage in my heart and in my head.

We now live together in our new home that we moved into several months ago and plan to be married in our garden late next month.

It’s been an intense year of getting to know each other, and yet seems like a very short year of enjoying each other’s company.

I am always certain that I know how to live and that my way is the best way.

Sprite lived on her own for seven years and she too felt that she knew how to live the best way for herself which makes sense since she didn’t have to accommodate anyone else.

She ran her own company.  I ran mine.

So although we began our relationship with no clash in underlying values, there were differences in the details.  Sprite preferred to be in bed by 9:00 pm and she awoke before dawn.  I was accustomed to going to sleep after 11:00 pm and waking after 7:00 am.  She was used to spending a lot of quality time with her significant other, which was different than the way I had lived for the past many years.

What to do?

We both decided to be flexible and willing to try everything a different way, unless it involved eating raw oysters (which I detest).

Fortunately Sprite doesn’t like raw oysters either, so there was no issue there.

As for my trying to do things her way, my ego would say that it didn’t turn out too badly.  My rational mind says that it turned out quite well. We have each benefited from one another’s strengths. Sprite has valuable ideas for my blogs.  I help her to better understand money and investment because she wants to learn more about those subjects.

Sprite is better at organizing than I am.  She arranged our closet so that it’s easy for me to be neat.  Of course, I am delighted when she occasionally leaves her boots outside of the neat closet because I feel more relaxed living with someone who doesn’t also need to be perfect.  I certainly don’t want to have to be perfect, at least not according to anyone else’s rules.

Sprite loves to cook and does it almost every day. While, out of health concerns, I never added salt to food, she does (along with a lot of lemon juice) and I find her cooking delicious. Her breakfasts and dinners are healthy, inspired, and a joy to look forward to.  I relish our Sunday morning treks to the local farmer’s market where we buy most of our food.  This has been a totally new experience for me.

What I have discovered in our year of getting to know one another better is this:

1. There is no “right” or “wrong” way to live. There are only “different” ways.
2. Something different might be better.
3. Many of Sprite’s preferences work better for me than my own.

And yes, we have each lost some “battles,” Sprite sometimes goes to bed later than she is used to and often skips her usual morning workout just to stay in bed with me.  But both Sprite and I have won the peace together.

Cheers to our February wedding, where my 102-year-old father will be our best man.

Alan

We all have a lot to worry about.  The future is uncertain.  None of us know if we’ll survive until dinner, let alone dance at our five-year-old daughter’s wedding.

Since we all worry, the only question worth asking ourselves is, “How much worry is too much?”

Sprite and I recently enjoyed the Spielberg movie “Bridge of Spies” while we were on a cruise (we highly recommended the Viking Star).  In this excellent film Tom Hanks portrays James Donovan, an attorney defending Rudolph Abel, who has been called “the most famous Soviet spy of all time.”

In one memorable scene Donovan says to Abel, “Do you understand that if you’re convicted you could be executed.”

“I understand.”

“You don’t seem alarmed.”

Abel pauses, then shrugs, “Would it help?”

Abel, portrayed by Mark Rylance, said it better than I ever could.  “Would it help?”

I have managed a business for more than fifty years, and I have run my life for seventy-six.  Something goes “wrong” every single day.  I am certain that something will go wrong tomorrow. I just don’t know what it is yet.

When I was young I realized one morning that I worried almost all of the time. In a flash of insight I suddenly realized that worrying was, at best, unpleasant and, at worst, draining away my life. In that moment I made a life-long decision to deal with my problems differently.

Now, when I start to worry I immediately ask myself if there is something I can do right now to change the outcome of whatever it is I’m worried about.  If my answer is “yes,” I start doing it.  If my answer is “no,” I stop worrying.

It’s simple, although it does takes practice – years of practice. But the practice is worth it.

Some of us seem to believe, as I did, that worry alone will somehow make life better or help me avoid misfortune. Maybe we think that, if we worry, the Gods will somehow solve our problems. But agony isn’t fun.  I’d rather forget about my problems and enjoy a football game or a salad.

So next time you feel yourself starting to worry, give it a try.  Either immediately start to do something about the problem, or stop stewing and move on to something more enjoyable.

Maybe I’ll worry, and do something about it, tomorrow.  Right now I’m headed to a lasagna dinner and watching a playoff football game.

Alan