Wouldn't You Like To Fly In My Beautiful Balloon?

 So today marks an anniversary for Wifey and me: 37 years of lawful marriage. Wow. Lot of water over and under the bridge of life, and plenty seeped through the dams.

For our first anniversary, January 3. 1988, I surprised her with a hot air balloon ride. We got up VERY early, and drove to Cutler Ridge, now Cutler Bay, and met the balloonist at a Denny's. We drove to the Redland, where his assistant was waiting, they inflated the craft, and we were helped into the gondola. It was a gorgeous Miami January morning, and we slowly drifted West, over fields and big farm estates. A highlight was swooping low over a yard where a woman was nude sunbathing -- startled when we called out a hearty "Good morning!" Balloons are fun.

After about an hour, we put down in a field, and the captain opened some champagne, telling us it is traditional to toast after one's first balloon ride. We complied, and then drove home to our tiny Kendall house, to awaiting dogs -- Midnight, the Black Lab, and Alfred, the Blonde Cocker Spaniel. It was a lovely way to celebrate.

I guess we DID celebrate in the ensuing months, because D1 was born in late November of that year. We dug her. We then moved to a bigger house, in the Fall of 1990, and in February of '92 D2 joined the band. We're all, thankfully, still together -- with a couple of sons in law born in South America, and a couple of grandsons, born at Holtz Childrens/Jackson Memorial, under the watchful eye of its Chief Medical Officer, Uncle Barry.

A few months ago, I met a young doc at the gym with the name of Lipson -- the same name as the "relief Rabbi" who married us after Mark Kram, a fake rabbi with no Jewish soul, bounced at the last minute for a free trip to Israel. Yeah --we have long memories. Sure enough, Dr. L was the Rabbi's daughter.

On NYE, I emailed him -- thanking him for his services 37 years earlier, and telling him of our family, and asking "See what you started?" He graciously responded, and asked for a prayer for peace in Israel. Claro que si!

So the vows Wifey and I wrote said we'd shelter each other from the storms of life, as Dylan sang. And indeed we have -- some literal -- like Hurricane Andrew -- and some existential -- like health crises, and the decline and death of our parents.

Tonight, the plan is much simpler than a balloon -- just dinner at Captain's Tavern, near our house. Wifey will get the lobster tail, and I will probably get the halibut, which I love ordering just for the halibut.

We will toast the years past, and, Big Man willing, still to come.

We've been married so long, the hotel, the Downtown Hyatt, was only a few years old. It's slated for demolition soon, to be replaced by a 60 story monster. So is the way of our beloved Miami -- nothing lasts too long here.

But our marriage has -- and long may it run.

And it's been indeed a lovely flight in that beautiful balloon of life...