There are a lot of metaphors for life. The road of life, the story of your life, the movie of your life... they all refer to the same thing, but they especially have one little feature in common: There's that one scene in every movie or video game involving a hero where the hero encounters an old man, who's very soft-spoken, and wise not out of intellect but experience. Then, that old man proceeds to hand down some advice that will come in handy far in the future, at a time you can't possibly see from the present, in a situation you can't possibly predict. It was nice to live that scene today, because it means that I just might be a hero.I talked to an old man who was a proud grandfather, and an even happier husband. He was happily married for 43 years to the woman who's still his dream girl. He had a lot to say about love and a happy marriage. The thing that caught me most off guard was that they had never talked of experience. The 'who did you sleep with before me?' conversation never happened. I don't know if I can have a relationship where that conversation doesn't happen - to me it's weird to live with secrets - but he's certainly got a hell of a point. That's typically been a bad conversation between me and the girls I've dated, or at least led down a bad path. And there's no doubt it's worked for him. His name was Fred, and after shaking my hand he got into his wife's Cadillac which he was getting washed for her, and I stepped into my thank-god-it's-finally-clean car and we took off in different directions. I guess today was a "road of life" kind of day.