13 years

one of the only things i know for sure is that starting and ending my days with him casts something wonderful over my life. it's a twice a day scheduled dose of warm and calm and right. i love him.

there's not much not to love. men love him because he is such a guy. he instinctively knows how to build or fix anything. he's a natural at climbing a mountain or kayaking a river. women love him because he does that and everything else without toxic doses of machismo and swaggering. when i met his work friends for the first time, the biggest and burliest stepped forward, shook my hand and said, 'hi, you must be sweetie.' now that's awesome. there are entire books written about how to 'get' a man like him - kind, loyal, supportive. and when i say kind, i don't mean nice. nice is everywhere. nice is....nice. but kind is in the blood or bones or spleen or cells or something. you can't fake kind.

he understands stability. when he built our house he would always tell me - 'invest in the things that you can't change - the things that ground the house.' so we did. we spent a lot on a fireplace and brick all over and windows - tons and tons of windows. and he was right, of course. and no matter what changes we make from here, those 3 things make it our house.

and beware of flying metaphors, but i can't help it. because marriage is the same. in a couple, you build and reinforce and put on additions and then find out that it's not to code - so you tear down and plan a little more carefully and build again, repeat, repeat, repeat. and as much as you change the look and the color and the feel of things, your supporting structure is always the same - and it's either strong enough or it's not. ours is.

i admire his life that seems to have such a quiet clarity of purpose. he loves being the husband and father of this family. and he's so good at both. the simplicity of it all gives it a sort of grace or elegance. or maybe that's just compared to the bumbling and fumbling through life of a certain oncRN who shall remain nameless. truth be told, we here at oncRN are not entirely sure why he loves us as much as he does. and it's not that i'm undeserving or unlovable - but what is it that makes someone love another so deeply, so completely, so calmly. i don't know, but it, to date, has been the greatest gift of my life.

i am deeply grateful to god or fate or the universal attractiveness of the mullet or whatever other force that drew me to him two decades ago.

cheers, baby!
i love you.

"...nor is it strange that after changes upon changes we are more or less the same."
paul simon - 'the boxer'