I met Mrs. Jazz at a college mixer my freshman year. I had been accepted to college, but only off the waiting list, so I had to start my freshman year in January. Six weeks later, on Valentine's Day (!), was the fateful mixer. Height of the disco era, mirror balls and smoke machines. It was midnight, I was hanging with friends and decided I wanted to see if I could get one last dance. I approached a total stranger with long brown hair and a turtleneck. A Mexican girl from SoCal. We ended up chatting (just chatting!) until the sun rose.
She was only the second girl I ever dated, but it probably took less than two months before I proposed (although we didn't marry for years later when I was in law school). She'd gone back to Cali to start her career, but pulled up stakes to join me back east, and worked minimum wage jobs before she could get back into her chosen field.
In Mirraflake's other thread, I quoted Neil Young - just around the next corner may be waiting your true love. That's what gets me about the last 40 years - we'd have never met if I hadn't, on a whim, approached her as the night was winding down. It was a huge school, we didn't go to the same classes and travelled in different social circles. A total case of one moment in time changing absolutely everything. Is that fate? Luck? Something else?
We're a mixed marriage when it comes to politics - she's a staunch liberal, and this will be, sadly, the first year I won't be voting for the Republican for President. Forty years of cancelling out each other's vote! I think my marriage is where I get my pragmatic streak from. I guess we're like Carville and Matalin - we don't avoid politics, we hash it out, we enjoy the give and take. But I have to know when to stop and not push things too far. And I can't say we've ever had a serious argument about the real important things like raising the kids. Finally - and I can't stress this enough - THE key to a successful marriage - especially of the opposites-attract variety - is to give each other lots of space and room to be alone with one's own hobbies and interests.
All in all, I'm a lucky man; I've got the greatest kids, my wife is my best friend, and, damn, she's hotter than the night we met. (Me, not so much)
