Today, in Miami, I had the honor of being the best man at the wedding of my cousin Ben, who is a very handsome and virile fifty year old, and Stephanie, who is beautiful, sassy, Brazilian, and one of the nicest people I have ever met.
Oh, right, I almost forgot. She’s also eighteen.
They are a perfect couple. Completely in love, comfortable with each other, happy just to be together. You can tell that they “get” each other. I have spent a significant amount of time in their company, enough to realize that they are one of the great couples that I have met in my life.
Lots of people in our family flew down for the wedding, but not everyone in our family was up on all the details. There was a point when one of my relatives and I were talking, and he turned to me, watching Stephanie and all of her other beautiful young friends dancing, clearly trying to figure out what he was seeing. And then he said “she’s younger than he is, isn’t she?”
“Yes,” I replied, “she is younger than he is.”
He thought about this for a moment. Then he said “she’s younger than thirty, isn’t she?”
“Yes,” I said earnestly, “she is younger than thirty.”
I suppose, as people come to know them, everyone will learn the lovely and astonishing truth about Ben and his bride. But why rush things?