My thoughts exactly.
They had 18 years to get married.
Call me cynical but I wouldn’t find that very romantic.
There is something about the reality of death that shakes people out of their 18 year complacency. We had neighbors who found out the husband was dying of cancer. Suddenly, the couple, who had been married for years, but never wanted children, were expecting a baby. The husband died when the infant was a couple months old. Personally, I’m glad that sometimes people succeed in taking that leap of faith and love before their time together runs out.
It’s like that parable where the workers who only worked for the last hour got paid as much as the ones who worked all day. Did they deserve full pay? No. But God is generous to people who show up at the last minute.