How old are you?

It must have been sometime in early 2015.

I was heading into our office for a mid-morning meeting.

As I entered the front door, I noticed a middle aged man of undetermined ethnicity, sitting unobtrusively in the waiting area.

“Is someone helping you?” I asked.

“Yes, the receptionist went to look for someone in the purchasing department, but it has been quite a while”.

“Hi, I’m Meyer” I said with an outstretched handshake “it’s nice to meet you, and you are…?”

“It’s a pleasure to meet you, my name is Jeff Kulbus. I manufacture high end disposable Incontinence products and I’m looking for a distributor."

“Ok, let’s grab a meeting room and we can get to know each other”.

We spent a half hour talking about our respective backgrounds and careers, and our love of family.

At some stage I inquired as to his age.

“I’m 43 years old.”

My jaw dropped incredulously, “You seemed significantly older..”

“I’m 43 years old” he repeated with a twinkle in his eye, “I'm 18 years of age, plus 43 years of experience”.

I have oft told this story and it never gets stale.

There is so much to learn from every individual, whose life experiences and relationships developed, are so incredibly valuable, regardless of their length of time on this earth.

True partners appreciate the respective, inherent value of each other and find ways to develop the relational touch points of each other’s lives.