This is a photo composite of Robin and me in 1963. She is seven and I am nine. We had never met, but because we were in the same school district, the same photographer shot the same style portrait. At this point in my memoir I want to share my viewpoint regarding finding one’s soul mate, life partner, or whomever you choose to share your love life with. I believe there is such a thing as Kismet, meaning two lives destined to be intertwined, and every experience, mistake, accident, and relationship is geared to get you to meet, communicate, and finally fall in love with that person. I don’t believe everyone gets to marry or even meet their soul mate in their lives, but I fervently feel every close, positive relationship you have is meant to be. I feel that the seemingly “out of the blue” bends and turns in life’s road lead you to a person that understands you, loves you, and wants to spend as much time as they can with you — and you with them. Call it “chemistry” or being “in sync,” but whatever it is, the relationship feels comfortable, it feels right. For instance I’ve bought and lived in many houses in my life. When you’re searching for a new place to live, there are some houses that are very nice, but you can’t see yourself living in them. Then you walk into a house you’ve never set foot in that immediately feels like home. It’s just like that. So if I’m right, every move, every relationship, every day that went by when I was growing up, brought me closer to my Robin. Going back through this memoir, there were a lot of strangers that helped us come together, Harry Truman and his bomb, Roger Babson and his dart, the Governor of Maryland who allowed women to enroll in the University of Maryland, and dozens of relatives. In New England I was about 300 miles away, now in Pennington we are just six miles apart. But it will still be another eight years before we talk to each other for the first time, and another forteen years before we both make a public commitment to be together forever at our wedding. I realize not everybody has the good fortune I have, and I make sure to count my blessings every day.

NEXT UP – 11 Baldwin Street