1961. It was a very good year.

Today is a day of celebration in my family. Today is my parents' 45th wedding anniversary! That's no small feat in this world of 50% divorce. And even better, they still actually like and love each other! My parents met in January of 1961. They were engaged by March, and they married in October. What a year, eh!! My mom was 21 and my dad was 27. These days, people would take bets on how long it would last. I wonder if anyone would've won their bet!

When I was growing up, I thought all families were like mine. My parents were nice to each other. They talked and joked and laughed and kissed and held hands and gave my brother and me the example of what a marriage should be. I figured I'd grow up, meet a great guy, get married and have the same kind of marriage my parents had. That's how it works, right? How hard can it be?

When I got old enough to start dating, though, I found that this relationship stuff was much harder than it looked. My parents made it look so easy. And as the years went by, and I loved and lost and loved and lost, I began to wonder if perhaps my parents had set the bar too high. Perhaps, hoping to find what they had was futile, and I was setting myself up for failure to think I could find that. There were even a few times I tried to convince myself that what I had in front of me was "good enough" - it might not be some great, undying Titanic-style love, but that was just Hollywood stuff anyway, right?

But then, I'd realize that my dad really would give my mom the raft, and he really would float in the frigid water, holding her hand for as long as he could. My dad really would save my mom from a burning building, give her a kidney, step in front of a bullet, or move a mountain for her. And my mom really would be Dana Reeve to his Christopher Reeve. She really would be there if he lost everything, and she'd say, "We still have each other." She'd be his rock when he was weak, his loudest cheerleader for his successes, his comic relief (about half the time without knowing it), and she'd face down demons for him. And don't we all deserve to have someone by our side who would do that for us?

It isn't just Hollywood stuff. It's real people. It's my parents. 45 years today.