Best....Year....Ever....

As is her wont from time to time, my wife paused in the middle of our morning run to ask me this question, "What was the best year of your life?"
My initial reaction was to answer in some borderline cynical way, deflecting the possibility of actual reflection. It struck me in much the same way that "What are you thankful for?" hits me on Thanksgiving. Is there a good and clever way to assess the preceding year with any sincerity? If you're me, the answer is usually "no."
But I fought the urge to reply, "Any year that doesn't include that question." One of my strengths, after all, is summing up, so I looked for some signposts in the road of my life. I have a very profound memory of my eighteenth year, but I cannot say that it was my best. There were still so many pieces that had yet to fall into place. It was the salad days of my teenage existence. It wasn't my best year.
When I turned thirty, I left my childhood home to strike out on my own with the woman who would become my wife. I had finally loosened some of the chains that bound me so closely to my fears. I learned to admit that I didn't know everything, and consequently I learned a whole lot more. That was a pretty good year.
Not the best. That might have been when I turned forty. My friends and family turned out to celebrate me, and I had a son, a house of my own, and a career to pay for it all. Middle age didn't feel so desperate. It felt like coming home.
Then I came full circle and realized that when I was forty, I hadn't been married by Elvis in Las Vegas. I was only beginning my stint as director and Master of Ceremonies at my son's school Talent Show. There was no blog back then.
I hadn't yet driven back home from San Rafael with my son riding shotgun, talking about all the things we had done that day. I now measure my days more by the successes of my child than my own. His yellow belt in Aikido. His first Jazz Band concert. The first time he talked about girls without flinching. And so I determined that eighteen, thirty and forty were all important and special because they brought me to the place that I am right now. It is still unfolding: This is my best year ever. So far.