"So this weekend, we've got...anything going on? Friday? Date night?"
"Yes, date night, actually it's our anniversary."
"Oh, right. I remembered that earlier this week. Sorry.
"I'm not mad. I made a reservation."
that's it. that's what our marriage looks like, a lot of the time; and it doesn't look romantic, or dramatic, or sentimental, but it is real.
Tranche de vie-- heh, our life sounds better in French.
Whatever language it's in, most pieces of this cake of our life have a big fat rose in the frosting, or some frosting, or at least the cake is baked through most of the way. It's got some flavor. It's worth trying another bite of this 16-year-old cake.
a few bites I've loved:
- Saying, "Yes" to your proposal of "Will you marinate me?"
- Sitting on the rooftop in the fog of San Francisco, taunting the future as we walked with no railings, giddy with youth and libations from the Blue Light.
- Seeing your super-grinning face at the altar 16 years ago, as our pastor quoted Dante, "Abandon all hope, ye who enter here."
Eating Chinese food three nights in a row in Paris, and ending each night at that funky little bar with all of the Ex-pats and the star fruit. - Spending the day at the Santa Cruz boardwalk after we signed the papers on our house.
- When I told you that the contractions, "just weren't that impressive." and you said, "I bet you're going to wish you hadn't said that."
- Holding hands in the little room where the parents talked about life while our children were in early intervention playgroup on the other side of the glass. Wishing we didn't fit in...fitting in just fine.
- Watching you build the most awesome pop-up camper so we wouldn't need to wake up the entire cabin in Montana... and sleeping in that cool camper when there were only three of us squished together, cozy and laughing.
- Snorkeling next to giant sea creatures in Turtle Bay.
- The time when you backed a fully-loaded trailer into a storage unit with only two inches clearance on each side while twenty people watched you maneuver.
- Nervously anticipating, then seeing the ultrasound of that little dancing-hula babyGirl.
- When you held me while I cried a little longer when the man came to the door to paint the numbers on the curb.
- Thinking we were trapped between a steep clover-shaped freeway exit and a too-low over pass in an RV with two children.
- All the times you wrestle with "all of those children" or any of the other stray kids who like to use you as a climbing wall.
- Every Wednesday Music in the Park, and every date night, and any night you try to whisk me out of the house.
- Seeing you laugh so hard I thought you might die while playing Cards Against Humanity.
- Any time you ever wear the Big Red Plaid Coat. It generally means we are happy and cold and with family.
- Friday night at the Lake House, side by side in those awesome chairs with you playing YouTube DJ. Extra love for the nights that our kid comes out of her room to tell us to keep it down.
- When you finally told me last year that you really never, ever, want cheese on your sandwich.
Because it is. No matter how you slice it.
I love you hubbins. Safe travels to you. Perhaps we can leave Chicago out of our anniversary next year, or at least be there together.
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