7 years ago I married my best friend-Happy Anniversary~!

Children are the barometers of life.  Just as the high pressure system brings certain weather, when children hit a certain age parents have a vague expectation of what to expect.  Before our family weather system started there was a marriage; the date that started the union which begets the anniversary and a series of reminders on Google weeks prior to that special day.

I knew that I wanted to marry my wife after our first date.  Of course I didn’t dare tell her that until after we were engaged.  The admission of true love and together forever after the first date might happen occasionally in real life, but it just sounds weird, doesn’t it?

Really, how do you know that this person is the one?  Cue the movie clichés where the lead actor or actress says, “you just know”, as the flashback montage of their dating life played to the music of Whitesnake or REO Speedwagon.

You just know.  Sometimes it’s not as flashy as fireworks in the background every time you see them, but you know.

For us we laugh.  More specifically she laughs a lot and I laugh on the inside.  We make the analogy that I’m the rock and she’s the bird that’s tethered to the rock that meets people, talks to them and is the happy face to the partnership.  Once the bird meets them, then the rock comes in, makes some dry humor and reinforces the social graces of the bird.

We also compliment each other’s pros and cons.  Me, I’m the person who starts things but has trouble finishing them.  I’ll start home projects, office clean ups and most things, but get distracted by shiny objects and cat videos.

She might be hesitant to start things, but always sees them through until they’re finished.  Sometimes it’s frustrating to work with that personality, sometimes not, but that is one of the great things about have a spouse.

At a point when we were dating it was time to get married.  That point, it’s similar to “you just know” in the whole scheme of how did you know that they were the one.   All of the family had met each other, ate many meals together and were on board with the defacto pending nuptials.

We got engaged before lip-dub proposals were a big thing on YouTube. However, I think that she would’ve been keen on one of those.  Instead of a lip-dub proposal I put a wedding ring inside a pair of shoes. They were new tennis shoes and it was under the guise of a present to her so that she could help me walk the dogs when she came down to visit.

We met at a fundraiser for a local animal shelter.  It was a non profit organization that a good friend of mine started that raised money for local animal shelters by having social events.   At one of these events I met this very cute girl wearing a Santa hat who I couldn’t take my eyes off of the entire time.  Fast forward

She was about to leave the house for the day as I gave her the present.  I started crying when I gave her the present, tried to look away, she was confused why I was crying, but thankfully kept opening the present.  Seven years later it seems like a typo to say that it’s been that long.  I know that for some marriages seven years is a short amount of time. For us it’s been a blast that has been highlighted by two wonderful children and a wonderful life together.

Marriage is awesome and I hope that yours is as great as ours.  For those that have been married decades-do you have any sage advice that people could benefit from?