There's been a lot of talk recently about anniversaries. First, it was the 20th anniversary of Pearl Jam's Ten, which also happened to be the 20th anniversary of my legal entrance into Adulthood. (Age of majority in Alabama is 19, in case you didn't know.) That one just happened to be the 39th anniversary of my mom's gruelingly long labor. There's the 10th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks this weekend, of course. (How the hell could I not remember where I was?)
But there's a private one that's come and gone, one that's more significant in my own world. It doesn't really matter to anyone but me, well, and this one other person. It's been 25 years since I met, and fell in love with, my husband.
I was a freshman in high school in 1986. Back then, Southern schools started in late August, not this early August bullshit that happens now. Summer was still substantial, mostly three months long. I remember starting at the gifted magnet school on a terrible rainy day. I knew three people, knew of a few more, and I was scared to death. It was within days of my turning 14.
On the Saturday after school started, a group of us met at the Village East shopping center in Crestwood, a suburb of Birmingham, to see Aliens. I remember very distinctly how the girl who would become my BFF didn't want to see Sigourney Weaver do battle again with the acid-dripping Geiger monsters, so she went to see something else. I seem to remember it was The Burning Bed with Farrah Fawcett, but I'm not sure it makes sense for that movie to have been in a movie theater. (Tiff, do chime in here, okay? The kids are going to bed, so I don't want to call you and ask. Happy 25th Friendiversary, btw.)
Anyway, one of the girls with us was in my classes, Amy. She was hot, and all the guys liked her. She was instantly kind of popular, which is weird to think back on. RLC wasn't really a popular kind of high school. I mean, we were all geeks in our own way—we were the gifted school, after all. There were also only about 150 students across four grades; it was hard to miss anyone.
After the movie was over, we were congregating in the parking lot, as we would be wont to do for the next four years. (Honestly, Trees—the school mascot was a freaking tree—is there a parking lot in the 'ham that we didn't take over?) Someone said something about "Amy's brother". I remember looking up and asking, "Amy has a brother?" As someone else said, "Yeah, him right there," I caught sight of this guy standing ten feet away. He was about 6'2 and skinny. Bad 80's haircut and acid washed denim, plus black Reebok high-tops. (Remember, it was 1986.)
I swear there was a freaking halo around the son of a bitch, and I knew in that moment that I would marry that guy.
It wasn't that I thought, Hmmm, that's hot. I really, truly knew that, one day, I would marry him. We would be in each other's lives for a very, very long time.
Somehow I'd missed seeing him at school for a week. We dated (in that non-driving, early teen way) for a few weeks before breaking up over some totally random, totally stupid shit. He left school at the end of my first semester, when his grades dropped and he was choosing to maintain his subsequent girlfriend rather than his GPA. I was heartbroken for months when we broke up. (Tiff, keep your mouth shut.)
His then-girlfriend was one of my very best friends. They were together for the next six years, during which time I dated a couple of people. We spent those years in and out of each other's lives, mostly as friends but as hiding-in-dark-places-and-kissing friends a couple of times.
I had a nasty early-summer break-up with an abusive boyfriend in 1992 and got my life back on track by fall. During this time, DH and his girlfriend were headed for a break-up themselves. I totally broke Girl Protocol and started a casual relationship with him. I swore to my BFF that it would go nowhere, that I wouldn't let it go anywhere. But what I knew after that first night together was that I loved him. I always had. And I always would.
I moved two hours from home in January of 1993 to be with him. I moved into his apartment almost immediately, and we've been together ever since. It's been an incredible journey, to say the least. Looking back, I can see the hills and curves of the rollercoaster, but the truth is that I wouldn't trade a moment of that time with him.
This is the man I have loved my entire waking life. Over half of this life has been spent with him. We brought two amazing children into the world, together every step of the way. We've been through some pretty crazy shit with each other—for and because of each other—but he's the man who absolutely knows me best. He tries every day to accept me for who I am, no matter who that happens to be on any given day. And I know damn well I make it really, really hard sometimes.
But what I also know, no matter what, is that he loves me. When I kiss him now, it's just like kissing him for the first time—my first real kiss, on the steps of the main high school, waiting for the shuttle bus to take us back to the annex building, in front of most of the freshman and sophomore classes. He's the man who makes me laugh, breathless and giddy, in the middle of the night at nothing. And he's the man whose touch can still make my heart race, whose hand on my hip in the middle of the night helps me settle back into sleep after a bout of insomnia.
So, baby, happy twenty-five years, and I love you. Remember that. Forever and always and no matter what.
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