You hear a lot of talk about what it takes to make a relationship work. Everyone has a varying opinion here. Some say money, some say balance, some say compatibility. I have a more basic idea.
Laughter. If you can’t laugh with your partner, through the years and through the trials and tribulations of your life together, you are missing what is in my opinion a key element in a successful relationship. For instance, take this video that I watched recently on YouTube of an elderly couple who’d been married for 62 years. They were entering the Mayo Clinic for a check-up and saw a piano in the lobby. Sporadically they struck up this dynamic duet which each of them at one end of the keyboard, playing a synchronized song. All the while they are moving and laughing like teenagers, despite their obvious age. This is what it’s all about ladies and gentlemen, laughing and playing together. Till death do you part.
So many couples lose the ability to even enjoy each other as they move through their lives together. Somewhere along the way it’s as though romance and playfulness seem to fall by the wayside, replaced by the wear-and-tear of being together for so long and enduring life. We forget after so much time to be kind to one another, to be playful and considerate and just nice period. As for me and my husband, we haven’t been together for all that long in the scheme of things. We met a few years ago on an online dating website. Already we sometimes forget to just enjoy each other. I forget to be thankful for the warmth of his skin when I hug him, or the feeling of him breathing when I lay on his chest, or the twinkle in his eye when he talks about what he loves. Even my dying grandfather, half-gone already from being rocked by the force of two strokes, still joked and laughed with my grandmother. Adversely me maternal grandfather died in misery and with no laughter whatsoever, having estranged himself from my grandmother many years before. The way they looked at each other as he held her hand and said goodbye reminded me of two people who realized only too late what they’d missed out on. I would rather that I were not the latter.
