Throw a Little Love Their Way

An open letter to my dearest love, on this, our 11th anniversary:

Most say that the first year of marriage can be the hardest, that it is difficult melding two separate lives into one. We have always talked about what a joke those statements were to us, because our first year was a breeze, or at least that is how we remember it. Year three came with its own unexpected challenges with the birth of our first child and the ensuing extended hospital stay and its frights, though even that we look back upon and think having kids is the absolute BEST! Nope, the first years of marriage and the first years of kids seem to have come and gone for us with relative nonchalance, or at least that is how I now remember them. But... then there is the ultimate reality that we enjoy a smattering of nonconformity or whimsy to our life and marriage. Call it over-achieving, call it my recently learned INFP issues of "acting like [my] dark, brooding thoughts make [me] superior to other people because [I'm] deeper and more complex than they are," or call it your ENTP of "needing other people to constantly praise and adore you for doing things so unconventionally and differently," but more than likely it is just tardiness... any way you shake it, it seems we've waited for that difficult year until we were a solid decade into things. 

Now I am not alluding to a struggling marriage, not. a. chance. However, I am pointing out that there seemed to be an abundance of struggles during this year of marriage. The only cause I can attempt to put my finger on is LIFE. Life seemed to catch up to us this year. Life, work, and simply not having time to be us. For we are at our best when we are together. You are my person, my best, my most favorite person to be with, ALWAYS! 

Basically this last stint that continues here on day 4,016 of marriage has reminded me that we are both still works-in-progress and that as those wise trolls from Frozen sang "We're not sayin' you can change him, 'cause people don't really change. We're only saying that love's a force that's powerful and strange. People make bad choices when they're mad, or scared, or stressed. Throw a little love their way. And you'll bring out their best!" 

Or perhaps you prefer the philosopher/songwriter Jason Mraz who said it like this:

"I'm here to stay and make the difference that I can make.
Our differences, they do a lot to teach us how to use
the tools and gifts we got, yeah, we got a lot at stake
And in the end, you're still my friend, at least we did intend
for us to work, we didn't break, we didn't burn
We had to learn how to bend without the world caving in
I had to learn what I've got, and what I'm not, and who I am."

As I spend time each year around our anniversary, taking stock of the year, and our relationship, and how #blessed we are, I never shy away from the difficult stuff, the stuff that makes us "learn how to bend without the world caving in", the stuff that reminds me "what [we've] got, and what [we're] not, and who [we are]." No matter what, those are the things that make us MAGIC!

My parting words to you, my dear husband of 11 years:  take that blank-ah-T-blank test so that we can stop making bad, mad, scared, stressed choices/word-tones to each other! That, and "lucky was the day you married me!" Like I said the other day, "imagine how long we could have been married if you would have just listened to me the first time!" 

Here's to year 11, true love brings out our best! #thosetrolls

PS: Plus I fixed the dryer! #youmarriedup #matchingbandaids