Today marks our 39th anniversary. It hasn’t been 14,246 days of bliss. Instead, it’s been a growing adventure; at times a rollercoaster ride of unexpected twists and turns and excitement and occasional feelings of danger and thrills.

Put another way, those 39 years can be translated into 20,514,240 minutes, many of which were devoted to work and sleep and not enough devoted to the pleasures of life and love. If that has been the case for your life so far, then change it.

You won’t get many chances to do it right.

You may already have learned enough about how to do it wrong.

I assume that our neurologist has enough experience with neuromuscular diseases and ALS to determine with a degree of accuracy how much time I have left. He was sharp enough to figure it out earlier than other doctors and without all the same effort and expense of three weeks at Mayo Clinic.

He says December, give or take a few months.

That’s fine.

Doctors are human. They make mistakes. In and of itself, ALS is a difficult disease to track down and diagnose.

Yet, I have no desire to extend misery and torture for a longer period of time than experienced thus far, though one more anniversary would make an even number; that’s just bragging rights.

We have always set a special occasion for our anniversaries; those and Black Friday. Yes, we celebrate Friday the 13th, but not for reasons of the occult. Our relationship started at a mutual friend’s wedding reception which occurred on Friday the 13th.

Calling it Black Friday just means it’s easier to remember. Our wedding was on a Sunday.

Miracle Sunday?