Once upon a time two young kids started to hang out together,
so much so that they got a whole lot used to it and each other.

The boy graduated and left for the military, but became worried
that the girl might get used to him being gone and might decide that she liked it.

What to do, what to do? He knew he loved her, but wasn't so sure of her feelings toward him.

He was brave enough or dumb enough to volunteer and let them send him wherever they wanted, certainly he was brave enough to ask the girl to at least wait for him.

Elaborate schemes ran through his head on how to pop the question, but elequance was not his game. He studdered, he stammered, he cleared his throat and she said yes.

Years passed by and the boy and girl became as one. They discovered each was the others best audience. They finished each others sentences so familiar each was with the others thoughts.

Where once they could run free and wrestle with the kids, and walk miles on end for the pure joy of it, they now discovered aches and little discomforts.

As life is designed where once they were two, plus three, time moves on and kids move on. Now they were two again.

Fifty plus years have gone by now and the two kids that were once young are not so young anymore. But time compensates us in some ways.

The boy is no longer afraid the girl will think the grass is greener and the other boys cuter. They are content now sitting side by side chattering and cramming as much life as they can into whatever is remaining.

They seem to hold hands more now as they've gotten older, but about
equally it seems to steady the other and steer a straight course, and of course,the hands that have been useful are now a means of touching, a wordless email, that speaks a message of reassurance and fidelity together.