THE SECRET OF A HAPPY MARRIAGE
IN about a month’s time, my wife and I will be celebrating 10 years of marriage. Perhaps I’ve been extraordinarily lucky, but I still puzzle over the suggestion people often make that you’ve got to “work hard” at a marriage. I say I’m lucky because, honestly, mine’s been a doddle so far.
Of course, the wife and I fall out from time to time. But really it’s only when we’re both tired and cranky, or when we can’t decide who’s turn it is to pay the window cleaner.
We don’t have kids, and I guess that helps a lot with maintaining matrimonial harmony, but we do have demanding careers, and we face all the usual trials and tribulations life often brings, so it’s not as if we’re never put to the test.
As a reporter, one of the jobs I’ve always thoroughly enjoyed is interviewing couples who are celebrating significant marital milestones. Covering golden weddings, diamond weddings and even the odd platinum wedding have all been highlights of my career. I even once met a couple celebrating a 75th anniversary which, oddly, has no official symbol. But it was quite an achievement, nevertheless.
Whenever I meet a couple whose relationship has lasted more than 50 years, I always ask them the same question – what’s the secret to a long and happy marriage? I figure it’s got to be useful for me in my own relationship to hear such advice.
I get a lot of different responses. Never going to bed on an argument is popular. Spending time together is another common one, and one I definitely subscribe to. One chap told me that putting the toilet seat down was key to his 60 years of nuptials. I can believe that, too.
But the best piece of advice I ever had was from an octogenarian who had worked hard all of his life, and who was clearly still fit and healthy, and in a warm and loving relationship.
When I asked him how his marriage had lasted so long, he responded with just two words: “Yes dear”.
At first, I was puzzled. And perhaps a year went by, while my wife and I were still in that blissful honeymoon period, before I properly understood what he’d told me.
He’d fathomed out, at some stage in his long and happy marriage, that just agreeing, going with the flow, accepting the wife is always right, is more productive than any number of red roses and boxes of chocolate.
Long marriages are almost becoming unfashionable these days but, I’d like to think that, in 40 years’ time, a journalist might just knock on my door to cover our golden anniversary. And if he or she asks me what my secret to a long and happy marriage is, I’ve got the answer ready.
Just as I was once advised in a confusingly diluted way about a decade ago, I’ll simply say to the reporter: “I’m on my way”. Because I honestly believe it is the ticket to matrimonial success.
It’s the sentence I seem to use more in married life than any other. I might have just sat down with a beer, about to watch my favourite television programme, and Little Miss “I’m going to stab someone” will have mislaid her favourite pair of shoes, which she absolutely must have for work in the morning. But I’ll be there, on my way, to help her look.
If the dog needs to go out and she’s halfway through her dinner, or an episode of Call the Midwife is reaching a crucial stage in a plot twist, then I’m always ready to be “on my way”.
If she’s struggling to zip up a dress, reach down for a cake tin, switch off the kitchen light because her hands are full, or she needs help clearing up spilt soup before the dogs devour it, then... I’m on my way.
And that, to me, is what marriage is ultimately all about. It’s about being there for one another.
We might have jobs that mean we don’t see as much of each other as we like but, for all the times that matter, we’re always on hand.
Whether she’s lost the TV remote, or whether she’s just had a call with some bad news and needs a hug – a good husband should always be on his way.