I was thinking about nude beaches.

That, in itself, is strange since I have never been to a nude beach, don’t know anyone who has, and would probably be very uncomfortable if I did. What I was thinking is that if you went to a nude beach you would probably embed mental images in your brain that you would have great difficulty erasing.

That’s because most people look a lot better with their clothes on.

But the more I thought about it, the more I realized that there was a deeper, perhaps even profound point to be made. It’s that beauty is not really skin deep, and that’s probably a really good thing.

For instance, if I were to go to a nude beach I would see groups of cells more or less artfully arranged (some more, some less), wrapped in some different kinds of cells infused with more or less pigment. I would be seeing them at a single moment in time, the victim of whatever gravity and bad habits might have done for them. Some may be beautiful now, but not later. Some may have been beautiful years ago, but not now. However, I wouldn’t bet on even the best arranged group of cells looking that good sixty years from now.

However, when you live with someone a long time, love them a long time it seems that things become much more than cellular.

Today is Linda’s birthday. She and I both seem to be having these on a regular basis, and we’ve both had a lot of them since we got married. There have been even more since I first kissed her on a five-minute-date at Jean Freeman’s party. I was the first boy she kissed, and she says that if I play my cards right, I’ll probably be the last.

The point, however, is not that we’re getting older. We are, and there’s not a lot we can do about it. The point is that as we’ve aged and changed, Linda hasn’t become less beautiful than she was all those birthdays ago.

And it isn’t that the changes were not noticeable. Some years back her hair decided it was going to be gray, and a few years after that, Linda decided that chemical coloring just wasn’t worth it. Now her faced is framed by silver gray hair, but, as the cashiers in the stores keep telling her, it’s pretty sivler gray hair. I think so, too.

Nor does she move as quickly as she used to. But that’s probably a good thing, since I don’t either.

The bottom line is that if we went to a nude beach together, I don’t know how she’d look to other people, but she’d still be beautiful to me. Simply because there’s something about living and loving together for a long time that makes things go way beyond cellular. Beauty is not reflected from the outside, but from the inside.

Happy Birthday, Linda.