0060! [ 02.02.2020 ]

Yesterday, on day 2 of a wintry wonderland snowstorm, we celebrated our fake anniversary. In 2019, when I turned around atop Penobscot mountain to find AB on his knee, the beautiful vastness of Maine and the blue ocean behind him, I was surprised - obviously and immediately I started crying. Early in our relationship he'd started calling me Tearanie whenever the fountain got going, a name so apt it always makes me giggle through the tears. In that moment neither the view nor the question caused the emotion. It was me and this sharp realization - I'm ready. I'm ready to legally and permanently take the step required to call you my husband. You've been my husband for years now. A paper and signatures not necessary to make you my family, my best friend, a person I can always count on. 

As we talked about the wedding, a date (like this place) lodged into my brain. I'd been excited about 2020 for dorky reasons, a perfect year with fun dates and a rare, universal palindrome. Only months away and peak winter, it didn't actualize. It also didn't stop us from walking to our backyard nature preserve and having a private ceremony, just the two of us. It didn't end how you'd expect but it reinforced the sentiment. I love you. Through thick or thin, I want you by my side. The next month brought more tribulations. A bad case of poison ivy, a health situation, and of course, the world pandemic we're all still enduring. There were some tough days, kinks and tangles we still needed to work out. Through it all I wake up every morning just chuffed* that your sweet body is next to mine. My forever partner in crime adventure. 

*(I'm not British, where did this come from? Probs GBBS?)

Yesterday, as we walked down to our spot in awe of the fresh snow and icicle cascade clouds, I was also in awe of us. How far we've come, how much we've learned. We swooned over a spotted hawk and edged along the creek. Uncertain steps, boots sinking into over a foot of snow. Tiny, perfect, mounds 'round every bend and rivulet. The magic transitory, always changing. Just like us, our love, and everything. 

The most wonderful lesson nature has taught me is that it's unnatural to never change, to always be the same. Every natural moment we've experienced is once in a lifetime, the creek never the same as the day before. Every time I stand next to a giant tree, so slanted but somehow still holding on, I remember - I am made of that too. The roots - my people, my family tree. The bends - the lessons and adjustments.

Later, at Cafe Roundy, I swooned at my luck, a delicious dinner, and the face across the table. You and me, we'll endure forever. 

~~~~~~~~~

Are you married? When's your anniversary?

(Roundy. 02.02.2021)