we are golden
I went shopping earlier this week, hoping to find a card to give my husband. Today is our 15th wedding anniversary. Fifteen years ago this afternoon, my father flung the sanctuary doors open, revealing me to friends, family, and my soon-to-be husband, and even now, when I think about the way he looked at me in that moment, I tear up.
Happily.
Thankfully.
Blessed.
I've never been a great fan of mass produced greeting cards meant to mark off birthdays, sympathies, or anniversaries. Often I'll stand before the colorful, typically haphazard displays, and become overwhelmed. Other times I'll read each one in a desired category, sometimes more than once, hoping to find the card to best describe what my heart wishes to say to the intended recipient. Very rarely, though, does that seem to happen. Such was the case this week. How do you wrap 15 years of marriage up succinctly in four or five lines of flowery prose when there's so much I want to say to him? I could add my own words to Hallmark's efforts, but when I've done that, I fill the pleasing white space with my charms, causing my husband to twist and turn the card in an acrobatic attempt to read my writing, while I'll have long finished reading the one handed to me moments before. The one signed simply Love, Your Husband.
My husband is a man of few words and I am a woman of many. There are countless nights I lay my head down at the end of the day and wonder why it aches before I remember that it's filled with all the things I wanted to say that day but never got - or took - the chance to, whereas my husband barely gets the words "good night" out before plunging into a deep sleep. I see it as frustrating. He probably sees it as a gift.
This has not been the easiest year of our marriage. We've spent far more days and nights away from each other than I care to tally. For the first time in its (amazing, impressive) 15 year tenure, we raised our voices to each other, and word(s) we've never said to the other were lobbed like grenades across the length of our living room and left to lie there, waiting to see how the other might react. I'm not at all proud of that. I thank God every day the man who made me well up with tears of happiness 15 years ago today may have ducked and looked for cover, but never once ran away. I pray that he's happy I didn't either.
I can't imagine life without him, the same way I can't fathom how it is 15 years with him have sped by. When I joined him at the altar on our wedding day, I only saw that day in my mind. I knew we'd have many together. I simply couldn't picture them in that moment. I didn't see our two amazing sons in our future, or the daughter we'll one day reunite with on another realm. I couldn't envision how we'd lift each other out of the depths of depression each of us would go through, or how we'd celebrate that which we have (thankfully, far more often than we've had to mourn for that which we do not). There's not a greeting card for that.
As I write this, my husband is downstairs with our boys, each of them skimming their game pieces across the Sorry board. The man of few words tackles the things I don't particularly care to do while I, the woman with (too) many words, spills a few. I hope he's never been sorry of any of the time we've had together during this rapid-fire 15 years. I'm not. Even though I never truly pictured our life together beyond the moment we married, I'd rush through our courtship and engagement the same way we did then to marry him again today if we were granted a do-over.
I have too many words, and the greeting cards I looked at (and ultimately left without) while on my shopping excursion didn't have the ideal ones, but in this particular moment, I can think of only single words that best convey what I feel today on our anniversary and every day after.
Lucky.
Grateful.
Loved.
Labels: it might be a crazy life but it's our life - I'm making that phrase ours, yo
50 Comments:
I believe this post would be the best "card" you could give him. Happy anniversary
Wow, what a wonderful post.
Congrats on the anniversary!!
This is way better than any pithy card would have been. What a wonderful post and tribute to your husband, your relationship and your love.
Happy Anniversary to you both, and may you have many years to come.
This is beautiful.
Awesome tribute - happy anniversary! And I love the cards that have the photos of people from the 1950's on the front - what a hilarious era.
Congrats! What you have is beautiful, and you're even luckier because you know it. Your post was beyond beautiful.
And thank you, by the way, for your very kind words.
I agree with the others: you've just written him something better than any greeting card I could imagine.
Happy 15th to you both!
Isn't that like 50 years in this day and age??
I suppose you should just buy some blank paper. :) Happy anniversary. I'm surround by unhappy people in unhappy marriages, so I love to hear about one that works.
Happy Anniversary to you both, and congratulations!
Truly - I honor the two of you for your love, extended over time. And for the thick-and-thinness of it. You guys 'get it'; thanks, on behalf of Molly and myself, and everyone else who is strengthened and encouraged by your perseverance. . .
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WordVer = 'pregu'. . . Hmmmmm. . . ?
Beautiful.
Happy Anniversary.
Happy Anniversary to the two of you. This is a beautiful way to tell him you love him. Way better than a card.
How sweet. Happy Anniversary.
That was beautiful, and your husband is a very lucky man.
All the best to both of you.
You just gave him a great card.
Suffice.
(at least you didn't rerun a post from last year, like I did)
I think this is perfect.
Happy, happy Anniversary to you both!!
Happy Anniversary, congratulations to you both!
This post alone, is a wonderful gift, give it to him with love.
Happy Anniversary! Beautiful post!
Beautiful. Happy Anniversary! To many, many more...
*sniff sniff*
This almost crushed my heart through my chest again.
What a beautiful tribute to your love.
awww-- just be sure to show him this post in leui of a card!!!
Sweet. Now the trick is to just somehow get him to read this post.
Here's to many more years, you two crazy kids.
Happy anniversary
I loved this. Happy anniversary!
GODDAMN TRANSIENT ALLERGIES.
Happy Anniversary, to FADKOG and her Tool Man. Love you both.
Belated Happy Anni .....
If your title is paying homage to the MIKA song then you are officially my favorite ever.
Whoo hoo!!!!! Congratulations and here is to 15 more years.
So beautiful! Happy anniversary. Sounds like you've been there for each other and you surely will be there for each other in the days to come.
I could relate to the board game playing, man of few words, blissfully sleeping husband. Mine just turned in after not being able to stay awake during 30 Rock.
Blessings to you both!
Beautifully done. And in just the right amount of words, too.
Many more, FADKOG and Tool Man.
So sweet. Happy Anniversary!
Happy Anniversary! What a great post! I consider myself a woman of many words, too, but I have to admit the cards, and my posts to my husband, have gotten a lot shorter over the years. Starting to match his ever consistent, "I love you, babe" cards. :)
Happy Anniversary! We had our 15th as well this year. I probably should have written something as nice as this, but I took the low road. :)
Congrats...here's to 15 more!
Just beautiful. Yep. I'd show this to your husband. Better than any card you could find.
Happy Anniversary.
And I came here thinking that I was good with my writing expressing how I feel to Claire...Clearly I have things to learn from you.
Amazing!
And congratulations.
Beautiful post. Happy Anniversary. You are so very blessed.
Now if you could just meet Joe Jonas, your life would be complete ;)
happy anniversary, sweetie.
xoxox
Very sweet loving post. (I didn't even post for my anniversary or a card...um yeah I rock)
Happy Anniversary!
Nice to be married to you best friend!
Glorious post. Like a fine wine, high notes and low notes that come together and leave me grateful for the opportunity to have tasted them both.
Congratulations and thank you for sharing the journey with your humble fans like me. Much love, TGFS.
My thanks to all of you for your well wishes! They are very much appreciated. We celebrated our anniversary with dinner out with our sons, where they dined on chicken strips and we paid more for them because we went to a restaurant where the food doesn't come in a bag. Later, I shared this post with Tool Man and in true 'man of few words' fashion, he smiled.
Onward and upward now!
Happy anniversary! And seriously? It took you 15 years of marriage to raise your voices at each other? Sheesh!
Happy Anniversary! Glad to hear it went well:)
What an amazing post. I wish I could write something half as beautiful for my husband.
And, as re "It might be a crazy life, but it's our life". . .
That fits us pretty well, too; you don't mind if I borrow it from time to time, do you?
Lovely and inspiring, FADKOG. I mean that in the least Hallmark-y sense of the words possible.
So glad you shared this with your Tool Man, by the way. Like others have noted, I only wish I could express these types of thoughts half as well.
Congrats! I wish I had more to say but I don't.
Much with the lust!
-Savage
Your husband sounds like a prince among men. Happy anniversary :)
I am celebrating my 15 year anniversary with my own prince on the 22nd!
you are indeed blessed, lucky, and dare i add wise to recognise it.
happy belated anniversary. here's to many more years of blessed matrimony.
What a beautiful post. It is so refreshing, comforting, and inspiring to see someone who is still so in love after many years and confident that you'd do it all over again. :) Congratulations.
This one made me tear up, and I don't DO that shit. Hope you two had a wonderful anniversary.
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