>>Don't worry, I would be the last to harp on this subject. I have two old friends who have probably been together for 20 years now and similarly see no need for legal blessing. They both say the same thing every time I have heard anyone ask if they are going to get married: "Why would be want to mess up a good thing?" They don't say "mess" but you get the idea <g>.
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>You know, a lot of couples say that, but I don't know why ... perhaps that's just their little joke. If you've been together long enough, I don't see how being married or not really makes any difference to the relationship. But hey, maybe that's just me. <g>
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Maybe it is their little joke. One thing i didn't mention is that Tom, the male half of Tom'n'Linda, is a devout Catholic. (One who doesn't push it on you -- the best kind). His wife died of cancer when they were in their early 40s, so he was a young widower. In his view of Catholicism you marry once, period. That's it. This might be debated but to him it was an absolute. Catholic widowers and widows can remarry within the church (right?) but to him it's not right. A case of being more Catholic than the pope, I suppose. It doesn't really matter in any practical sense because they both had grown or mostly grown kids when they met, and neither was interested in having any more. "Young man," Tom once told me (he addresses everyone younger than him that way, as young man or young lady), "Grandchildren are absolutely terrific." Then he looks at you intently and his eyes get that Irish twinkle. I think Linda found a good one, don't you? And so did he.