Buckingham Palace Refrigerator Magnet

I started dating my husband, Frank, almost 18 years ago; we met on October 2, 2006. If our involvement with one another were a person, it’d be old enough to join the military—probably the Navy, since that’s the gayest branch of the armed forces, owing in large part to the indisputable truth that sailors get the cutest outfits. (The least gay branch is of course the Marine Corps.)

I personally know only one other gay couple who have stayed together longer than we have—and, actually, they’re in a throuple now, so I guess that particular couple technically no longer exists, and Frank and I are the longevity champs after all.

When people ask us the secret to long-lasting connubiality, Frank replies with an acronym of his own devising: FACTS.

That stands for:

Forgiveness (you gotta let things go)
Ambition (you gotta have goals)
Communication (you gotta talk stuff out)
Travel (you gotta be compatible on the road)
Sex (you gotta keep banging)

Finally, the combination of these five marital must-haves gives you a sixth into the bargain: FACTS—i.e., you gotta tell the truth.

We were at a dinner with some of Frank’s work colleagues when I first heard him share this wisdom. I had no idea he had formulated the acronym, which calls into question his commitment to Communication. But maybe he needed a C so that our secret to staying together wouldn’t be FATS.

Frank’s answer to the question of why we have gone the distance is better than the one I have supplied on occasion: inertia. But then, I have an aversion to dispensing wisdom and, let’s face it, I also have a bit of a mean streak.

One thing I do know about being with the same person for a long time: You start to feel unmoored and vaguely depressed if you spend more than a couple days apart.

Or maybe that’s just me?

Frank recently spent two weeks in England without me, and it seemed like I filled most of that time by staring forlornly out the window and singing the lines from A Chorus Line that go, “Who am I, anyway? Am I my résumé?”

Hey, there’s a C for you: Codependency.

Frank brought back a Buckingham Palace refrigerator magnet as a souvenir from that U.K. sojourn. He’s a big fan of touring the palaces of Europe. He always wants to get the residence’s official audio guide so he can bone up on all the 18^th-century hot goss as he shuffles through the royal apartments while sporting a headset that has been worn by millions of previous tourists.

Personally, I think those audio tours could do with a little more hot goss and a little less staring up at the ceiling while a historian who you just know looks exactly like Nancy Kulp yammers on about crown molding till you get a crick in your neck.

Frank probably fast-forwards to the good parts. Though a fan of palaces, he’s not a stickler and he’s not stuffy about the experience.

While we were in line to see the Palace of Versailles in France, for instance, Frank briefly left me to hold our spot so that he could go to the bathroom. When he returned, he said, “I wonder if Marie Antoinette ever thought she’d have a Puerto Rican pooping at her house.”

I laughed and laughed. You gotta be compatible on the road.