It is a long time since my last posts. The wedding plans are still moving forward on track pretty much. The site is reserved and the caterer selected. This past weekend Joyce and I met Bill (friend and Jeweler) in Pebble Beach, at Marilyn’s house to attend the ATT golf tourney. Bill brought two diamonds and we selected one. At last!
The candidates were 1.84c (H, SI1) and 2.01(H, SI2) carets, both were nice stones but the 1.84c was a little brighter (we thought) so she selected that. The ring that Bill hade made looked a little narrow for the stone so he will make a new on 5mm wide. He thought it would be ready this week. We were excited all day after finally getting that part settled.
There remain some things to be worked out that may be difficult but manageable. The first is the irrevocable by-pass trust that I have; second is the choice of houses; and finally the merging and changing of our life styles.
The trust problem is just a matter of selecting the correct strategy to manage the assets and assuring that we can assess the money with out creating a large liability if Joyce outlives me. We will meet sometime later this spring with a financial guy to discuss this issue. The worst case will probably be that we will need to create a complex prenuptial agreement that will limit and define the community property transfers. The prenuptial is expensive and annoying but otherwise probably otherwise ok.
The house situation is more difficult and may end up being much more expensive. The problem is we have two similar homes now. Joyce preferred staying in her house originally, and I agreed but after thinking about it and discussing it we now think that may not work. I want some of my things and she has her house fully furnished and decorated, no room really for my much simpler things. Her house is very feminine and she likes it that way, I think. Anyway now we are considering building a new larger house on her lot! The new place would be larger and easier to fit the two of us in. We are still thinking and will start planning when we get a little more information.
The “life style” issue is still more complex I think. This comes from our differing views of what being married means. We agree that the marriage means that the spouse is the most important person in our lives but we don’t have the same concept of what that really means. I was married for 40 years and over time I developed a habit of being with my wife nearly all the time and doing most things with her (although I may remember it differently than the really was!) and Joyce was single for many years and has developed a very outgoing life and has many friends. She is used to doing things with them without needing to consider anyone else. For example she pretty much told me that during tax time when she is very busy she would have no time for much social life or other activities. I planned around that and assumed that would be ok. However she continued to do other things with her friends but when it came to time with me she asked me to stay away more. I took that to mean that she was giving her friends more priority than she gave me. We talked about and although the results are not visible yet I think we agreed that she will figure this out to. My conflict includes the fact that I want an independent woman but maybe that independence is troubling too.
At the end of the day we are very much in love and are looking forward to our living our lives together.
