I also got the “you’re doing it wrong” vibes from my parents before I was 40 (with a brief interlude for my first marriage, but then back to me being a screwup and I did everything about my first marriage wrong), but I redeemed myself with my second wife. This past week, doing cleanup in my home office (the bed bug people really, really dislike clutter, nevermind where it might be in the home) I found cards my folks had sent (that pile of cards we keep just in case we need to ever refer back, but never do? This time I did. Life is weird) to us and every single one talked about my wonderful wife, how I did so well by marrying her, etc.

Which pissed me off. What, my life revolves around my wife? The best decision I’ve made in the last 17 years was marrying Deb?

Calming. Thinking. Well… yes, dammit. It does, and it was.

So fine. Just frakin’ FINE, okay. Still irked by how I got treated the preceding decades. Hrmph!