A couple of weeks ago, Jackie and I were in Lynchburg, visiting with her mother Myrtle, who is now in a memory care facility. This place, these people, the service they give and the comfort they provide, have been a blessing to the family. The journey to this point has been a lifetime of conflict, estranged relationships, and bitterness, sprinkled sparingly with a dose of calm and even joy.

Like all of us, Myrtle was shaped by the environment she was raised in as well as the cultural norms of her day. She was a precocious child of high IQ, skipping entire grade levels, and questioning authority, while trying to avoid being a misfit. As a young adult she was on the forefront of computer programming for the banking industry, shattering glass ceilings in an industry ruled by the good ole’ boys. She was a strong but troubled intellectual, living and operating in a man’s world. I was fifteen when I met Myrtle. By then, she was showing signs of mental illness which had no name and no treatment. She was on her third marriage and had learned to distrust, if not loathe all men. I was dating her baby girl, the only child from husband two, and I became the very embodiment of the sins of men everywhere. She and I have maintained that love/hate relationship for 40 years.

Myrtle has dementia now, and it has rapidly robbed her the recall of a great portion of her past. It is an amazing thing to witness someone being totally present – with no other choice, since the past has been obliterated and the future cannot be fathomed. I walk into her room and she embraces me while holding my body tight to hers. She cannot make her lips form my name but she knows me. We sit and converse as best we can – like a Drew Barrymore scene from ’50 First Dates’ – our smalltalk questions and answers on an endless repetitive loop. “I’m so happy you guys came to visit – Phil your hair seems shorter than the last time I saw you. I’m so happy you guys came to visit – Phil your hair looks shorter than usual to me. I’m so happy you guys came…”

I have come to learn that many of our societal and individual ills are a result of our inability to be present. We spend so much time reliving our past, either our bygone glory or our painful mistakes – and so much time in the future, worrying about things that may or may not ever happen, that we miss the beauty and power of the now. I have often thought, what a gift it would be if we could take the magic pill that would make us forget our collective past. I was wrong. Myrtle has taught me that the present without the context of the past and a future without perspective, is a curse.
Being fully present is the ability to observe our past without judgement, for it is merely the vehicle that has brought us to this moment. Presence is the further understanding that the Now is the only time we have available to us, and the future is simply the next moment, and the next moment, and the next moment…
Myrtle has uncovered the reality that my present moment is cold and void without the collective moments of my past which provide a foundation for my future.

Today, Jackie and I are celebrating our 35th wedding anniversary. 35 years of commitment, 420 months of faithfulness, 12,775 days of perseverance, 306,600 hours of passionate love, compassionate forgiveness, and eternal oneness. Our very best times are when we are fully present with each other – our bodies, our thoughts, our love, all in a timeless rhythm that matches the cadence of our intertwined hearts. However, the magic of the present is in the collective moments of our past – that moment when our hands first touched, when our lips first lingered, when I couldn’t wait to hear her voice again, when we saw our first movie together, when we went to our first concert with friends, when I sang to her over the phone, when I broke up with her, when I ran back to her, when I got down on one knee, when she said ‘I do’, when she delivered our babies, when we had trouble making ends meet, when we were discouraged, when we were angry, when we came through, when our kids got married, when we cried over death, when we were scared, when all we could do was hold on to each other, and then when we danced. These are the moments in time that created my present moment, and I pray that they are never ripped from my knowing. My past informs my future and lets me know that I need not worry. We have already lived through joy and sorrow, tragedy and celebration, abundance and need, and have learned that our love from within and without sustains us.

The greatest gift to be offered today is our thankfulness – for each other, for our tribe, for those who entered our life for a time and left, for those who have walked life with us forever, for those we only happen upon, and those we will never meet. Let’s be thankful for our past and the hope it provides for our future – and join with me in gratitude for our Now.

Happy anniversary my love, and cheers to those who may encounter us in our Happily Ever Now.

May we all live large, and love much!