Young Love

 

Highflyer and I recently celebrated our 6th anniversary. I am still madly in love with him and so is he if his words and actions are to be trusted. Needless to say, we are very happy about this fact and do not take it for granted. 

While most of our friends who have been together with their respective partners for a much longer time give the impression to still like and appreciate each other, this is definitely not the norm for couples our age as I am often reminded of at restaurants or in hotel breakfast rooms, where other middle-aged (eeeek) couples mostly seem united by mutual dislike and annoyance. The fact that we still have something to say and listen to each other is different from the "loaded silence" that seems to cloak other pairs. 

Mind you, other people might find it highly disturbing and could get the wrong signal if they saw us share the same room, each engrossed in their separate online bubble (Highflyer playing chess or commenting in his favourite forum, me rotting my brain on Instagram or YouTube most likely) for longer than is socially acceptable. And I love that we both appreciate that the other one is totally fine and comfortable with it.

We don't engage in outrageous embarrassing PDA, but still are very affectionate with each other and this is also something that seems to stick out from the mass of other 50somethings. 

I like to think our "secret sauce" is the mix of typically not being together 24/7 unless on vacaction, having met later in life when we both knew exactly what we were willing to compromise on and what were non-negotiable red flags, and also that we do not have children together. Highflyer (who is the father of three children) actually agrees to the latter, too. Very likely that we would have come out of this "next level relationship test" unscathed, but as we won't find out, I know that it has definitely made things easier and means less responsibility for me at least. 

For the record, most of the above-mentioned (outwardly at least)  happy couples among our friends do have children, so even more kudos to them!