There is a quiet, unremarkable moment that visits every long marriage. It does not announce itself with drama. There is no slammed door, no tearful argument, no single event you can point to and say, "That is when things changed." The moment arrives softly, on an ordinary Tuesday evening, when you look across the dinner table at your wife and realize you have not really looked at her in weeks. You have glanced at her a thousand times. You have exchanged information about schedules and children and bills. But you have not truly looked, the way you once did when the mere sight of her could lift your whole day. The spark, you think with a pang, might be fading. And you wonder if this is simply what happens, if all couples eventually become companions and co-managers rather than lovers, if the fire dims by some law of marital physics that no one can escape.