At JFK yesterday I was blessed to observe and overhear a classic conversation. There was a UNC graduate student, 28-30ish tall, pretty, tattoo on her arm, Doc Maartens -- who was being chatted up by a pilot who was probably late 40s-early 50s. He was talking about 90% of the time, pretty excitedly. Having set the stage, I'll just convey a few snippets which should
"If I had been smart enough to go to UNC graduate school in English..."
"How did you get to be such a good student?"
"...I fly an Airbus 320 for JetBlue."
And so on. You get the picture.
It took me back to the classic scene from Moonstruck (I have blogged about it before)-- which in memory still sits high in my pantheon of the greatest movies of all time, meaning I need to see it again. With her philandering husband out somewhere with his younger girlfrient, Olympia Dukakis dresses up nice and goes to a restaurant. A guy about her age who looks like but is not Buck Henry asks if he can join her. Turns out he's an NYU professor who has fucked up his life sleeping with students. So she asks him, "Why do men chase younger women?" After a brief pause, perhaps a hem or a haw, he responds "Becuase they fear death."
Bingo. Wiser words were never spoken. Which implies that the secret to a stable marriage is to participate in the cycle of life fully -- raising children, attending weddings and funerals, mentoring others, owning pets, reading history books, advocating for good governance -- so as to fear death less.
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