The issue with this thread is that you young guys are trying to look at this through the lens of a young man to whom thin and pretty has the most value. Y'all do not have the perspective of a man who has been married for decades. How could you? As you go through life with someone you value different things.
In youth you value looks and potential to be a good wife and mother; you value beauty and being able to lock down a woman who others want.
In the child rearing years you value nurturing, and the ability to raise and guide children, and ability to contribute to your success as a team in life.
In the post child rearing years you value mutual life pursuits, goals achieved together, family, grandchildren and the legacy that will be left for the family.
In the senior years you value loyalty, companionship, mutual comfort, understanding and compassion.
Notice how after youth the focus shifts away from surface attributes like physical appearance and transitions to characteristics that are lasting. Even a great beauty of the ages like Sophia Lauren or Elizabeth Taylor is only beautiful in the eyes of the world for a finite amount of time. Although a man and woman always retain memories of their spouse in the prime of youth, the value added over time is in the mutual effort and bonding and shared goals throughout a lifetime. A dashing man may lose all his hair and go gray and get a belly and a dad bod just as a hot woman may gain weight and settle in middle age. In old age wrinkles and thin skin and loss of vigor is inevitable. Time comes for all of us, no matter how physically blessed we may be in our youth. The wise accept this inevitable change with grace, yielding to time and accepting wisdom in the stead of beauty.
I see lots of elderly couples through my work in healthcare. Many of whom have been married for decades, many of whom have raised children together, buried parents together, attended weddings and funerals and graduations and baptisms together for those decades. They have loved, they have lived, and they have lost together. Almost without exception these couples are steadfastly loyal and fiercely protective of one another. Many enjoy a daily happy hour together at home, many show off pictures of children and grandchildren, many are full of pride about their spouse and the value they see in their spouse forged over a lifetime of joy and sorrow endured together come hell or high water, and they have deep abiding love and respect for one another as well as a strong sense of duty, of family, of principles.
They will all almost universally assert that their spouse thinks they are nuts, but in a sweet and teasing and "well aren't we all nuts" kind of way.
They have evolved past the values of youth and instead find the greatest value in the endurance of life together, for in the final analysis life is a marathon not a sprint, and the award goes to those who persevere through hardship with an indomitable will. They cherish each other for the willingness to endure together as a team, and they share a knowing of one another and of life that is at once awesome and humbling.
