If you could give yourself one piece of advice on love and relationships when you were younger, what would it be?

I think mine would be pretty simple: It’s easy to fall in love. The key is to fall in love with the right person.

People are almost universally good, and worthy of love. Circumstances and spontaneous events can set the stage for us to fall in love with nearly anyone. Which says a lot about humans’ capacity to love others, and others’ capacity to be loved. (Why, you could say our entire species depends on it!)

But, we shouldn’t do that. My younger self thought the falling in love part was the special and unique part. It is, kind of, but lifelong joy belongs to falling in love with the right person.

These days, it feels like a stroke of luck that Dave and I entered into each other’s lives. If I hadn’t gone to that college, if I hadn’t taken that one class, if I hadn’t forced my way into that interview, if we hadn’t met again before law school, if I hadn’t had the courage to send that one email… How else was this bookish Greek girl from Philadelphia supposed to find and marry a snowboarding surfer guy in Tahoe?

But, I also like to think it was both of us, finally at the right age, to realize when we were meeting the right person, falling in love with the right person.

Someone who you can work with and through, someone who still manages to teach you about the world and life after 16 years, someone who abides your faults and doesn’t fear your eccentricities, someone who you can disagree with, someone who feels like home. (And after this weekend, someone who you can build a freestanding, mitered corner bookshelf with. Because…WE ROCKED IT.)

Love sometimes isn’t enough; love sometimes is the easy part. Twenty-year old me didn’t realize that.

It’ll be interesting to see what love advice will look like in another 30 years. Perhaps less about attaining love than maintaining love.

How about you? What would your advice to young you be?