31 years ago today...
I got married.
Can't remember what time of day the big event occurred.
I remember it rained. I remember worrying that my borrowed
wedding gown might get muddied up, soiled, marred, damaged
beyond repair.
I remember that 2 hours before the time (whatever the time
was), the rain stopped.
I remember my husband's brother telling him he still
had time to make a clean getaway.
I don't remember where we went that night. The lake?
The city?
I remember that bottle of Blue Nun someone
gave us exploding in the suitcase (quite an appropriate
demise for a blue nun and for Blue Nun--which tastes
like what it is-- cheap wine).
I remember a week or so later, a box with two broken
Phaltzgraff soup bowls and a note from my mother
wondering where I was.
I remember not knowing where I was for a very long time.
*
Happy anniversary to my husband who has stood beside me
all these years. Who has watched me suffer and tried his best
to help. Who has watched me in the happiest moments of my life
and been made happier because of those moments. Who has
not understood so much of who I am but who tries to understand.
Who doesn't like much of anything I like (except my food) but
who supports me just the same. Who has been a hard worker,
and many times, absent father, but whose heart is always
in the right place. Who doesn't give up on me. Who has not
ever given up on me.
8 comments:
Happy Anniversary Maggie!
Celebrate...
Hey you!
We had a brief celebration. He's on the road again for a race in Indy, but we had lunch before he left.
I thought you'd given up on me...you took me off your "good places to click" list, and I felt so unimportant and insignificant, but that's just me wearing my heart on my left thigh thing.
:)
And a happy belated anniversary to you. The painting you gave your wife if a lovely gift. I hope she's enjoying it.
Love to you and yours.
my blog sucks...
i was messing around with it and lost a bunch of my links
but i figured nobody reads my post anyhoo.
i wear my heart on my right
I always read your posts, you right-hearted guy!
:)
Have a good evening!
How did you meet your husband?
Did you know he was it?
Was it love at first sight?
If not for you, for him?
And Zola, how'd you meet your wife?
Did you know?
I love to hear these stories. I love to know how people fell in love.
My parents met in high school. My father was a year younger than my mother but had had his eye on her for some time. He finally approached her one day after school and asked her if she liked Glen Miller--she did--and if she'd seen the movie--she hadn't.
He said he knew the first time he laid eyes on her.
She said it took her a while to warm up to him.
But then, she was one cool customer.
I love thinking of them both tall and pale and gangly limbed talking about big band music in the projects of Cleveland.
Congrats on your anniversary, Mags.
And belated congrats to you on yours, Mister Z.
Laurel,
I met my husband when I was a senior in high school. I knew who he was because he was a friend of my ex-boyfriend (wild bad boy who all the girls wanted and I was still crazy about--yikes!).
I was driving around one night in this small town, and I stopped at one of those lots where people stop to hang out and talk and to look for girls/boys--a strip mall.
It was winter and quite cold. I was wearing a blue jean jacket that came down to my calves. I had on some hippy skirt thing and boots. He had on a multi-colored sweater and blue jeans.
He was sitting in his car there in the lot and I thought:
Hey...that's that guy you met once upon a time. He seemed nice so why not pull up next to him and see what's going on, so, I parked next to him and got out to adjust the piece of cord I had holding up my muffler.
He got out of his car and asked if he could help me. We rigged it up and then went for a drive/parking thing.
We went to this defunct ballfield out in the country and parked in front of this boarded-up abandonded house. I remember feeling that the ground we were parked on was somewhat sacred or not conducive to steamed-up windows and small talk. Weirded me out but not enough to want to leave.
We talked a lot and kissed some. Mostly, we talked. I laughed so much that night, laughter that came from deep inside of me.
And I thought, this guy is funny--he's smart and funny, and he's not all about scoring.
The next afternoon, there was a knock on my parent's door.
I answered. He was standing there asking me if he could borrow my car for a few hours. He said I could have his, and he left it.
When he came back, I had a new muffler on my car and a new boyfriend.
His mother told me once that he thought I owned the moon and stars and that he loved me more than I could or would, perhaps, ever know.
She said she knew it in his eyes.
And for all that has happened in the in-betweens, that love has never diminished.
Carson McCullers (and other writers) have spoken about the lover and the beloved.
I think there may be some relationships in which each person is both, but rarely.
What is it DH Lawrence said about the three things needed to sustain a relationship? Body, spirit, mind. Or something like that.
But those three have not been here always, in this relationship, and we have worked hard to make it work.
There are things I have never written about. I am too close to them.
There have been failings and heartbreak and loss beyond description.
But the things that are constant are what sustains me.
And the things that are temporal but relevant, keep me here.
Thanks for asking, Laurel.
I wish I could ask my mom how it all got started, but we don't really talk, if you know what I mean.
Oh, you should ask her.
Don't you want to know?
Gosh, she's not even my mom and I want to know! (smile)
Thank you so much for sharing your story, your love story with me.
I'm sitting here smiling in the half-darkness.
My father was the lover, my mother the beloved. When he died, he became the beloved.
I'm glad that you said what you said about working hard at your marriage, your relationship.
Bette Davis once said that old age ain't for sissies. But I think that quote could apply just as effectively to love and marriage.
My parents weren't always in love with each other. But there wasn't any problem too big that they weren't willing to face together. They stuck it out because the alternative, walking away from the marriage, from each other was unimaginable.
I love that they loved each other more than they loved me and my brothers. I was always jealous of that love. Even though I couldn't articulate that jealousy, I recall trying to get in between their love, to try to make either one of them, especially my father, to love me more.
Of course, there's no getting in between that kind of love.
I love that they loved each other enough and loved their life together enough and loved my brothers and me enough to stick with it, to work at the relationship, to never give up on it.
Thank you for saying what you said here.
I, too, am the beloved.
Your parents were extraordinarily devoted to one another, weren't they?
I have to fess up that I am more into my kids than my hubby (he'd tell you that too), so I can't say that we love each other more than we love our chldren, like your parents. And though there was a jealousy there, you still loved the fact that they loved each other that way.
I was, for so many years, mom and dad both to our children as my husband worked such long hours trying to get a business started and to still work full-time at a manufacturing plant here.
I decided when my first child was born that I wanted to stay home with him. Then I added my second, and I wanted to stay home with her. So, I didn't return to work until my oldest started third grade and my daughter started kindergarten. We were a one income household and we struggled, but I wouldn't have had it any other way than to be a stay-at-home mom.
All that time together strengthens those parental bonds, but it can also make your children too dependent. I had to be careful that I didn't create that with them. I want them to know I am always here for them, but I want them to be comfortable making their decisions without me. Of course, two of them are grown now, but that doen't mean they don't like Mom and Pop's input.
Hubby still works way too many hours (about 15 a day), so that doesn't leave much alone time. By the time he gets home (and it has always been this way), he's worn out and just ready to eat and go to bed. The kids and I generally ate before he got home or we would have been eating at 8:30.
Now, unorganized as I am, many nights it's nearing 7:30 before I manage to get a meal cooked, so he makes it home every now and then in time to sit down to dinner with us.
My mom told me once (and perhaps more than once) how she and Dad met, but I can't remember the details. Through the years, I have learned to stop listening when my mother speaks. Long explanation for that, so I'll spare you. Let's just say that when I'm with her, I have rather selective hearing.
I know my siblings know the story, and one day, when I can think differently about my mom, I'll want to hear them tell me it again.
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