Love Song

It's a sweet thing, our anniversary. It comes in the middle of a Georgia winter, right in between Christmas and Easter. I just have to say it: I hate winter. Mama said that Daddy hated it too, though I never really knew that until today. It's too late to ask him about it, but we shared two hates: chicken and winter. Yes, I despise chicken, though I choke it down when I have to. Beef is the real deal. There's a diet that talks about blood types and all that, and they say that my blood calls out for beef (and bison). I'm an O positive. Praise the Lord and pass the burger, minus the bun.

Even though it was our fourtieth anniversary and that means a "Ruby" year (oh I love rubies!), we opted for the Carroll Symphony and a local hotel, more like a staycation. We dashed about, after Ken got home from work, threw some things in a bag and checked into our hotel. We lounged around and ate some $20 snacks, when suddenly it was time to go. I told that man we were gonna be late, but he don't listen. Ken qualifies for NASCAR getting anywhere, but when it comes time to park, he meanders around the lot until he finds the choicest spot, usually far from any entrance we're planning on entering. Then it takes several turns and precise maneuvers until he can back the car into that oh-so-special place. I slink down into my seat in embarrassment while people wait for our back-in. To add insult to injury, he has to completely clean out any trash, arrange all his paraphernalia just-so before he will exit the vehicle. On this night, steam was coming out of my ears. As soon as he put the car into park, I was out the door and stomping across the lawn to the venue. I done tole ya and tole ya we were gonna be late and now we were. We rushed in the door and sat down, too close to the front. No music was playing yet and he said something about that, but I wanted to be mad for awhile. 

Finally the music starts and I am in awe of the amazing musicians, the lush sounds, the acoustics in the building. I stop and think about this man beside me, who dressed up and brought me to hear the symphony. A man who'd rather be pretty much anywhere else. He didn't complain, heck, he even gave me running commentary on the finer points of the music and the people playing. Then he indulged me afterwards when we went to the restaurant, being okay with eating with some of my music nerd friends. He prefers a booth, with just me and him, but apparently he loves me and I wonder how. 

Fourty years of marriage is a long, high mountain. You'd think it would get easier, more like a slide than a hike. But it doesn't. There's the flush of first love, then the honeymoon, then the years of struggles with children, work, fixing up houses, decades of casseroles and messes to clean up. You blink and the kids just disappear somehow, only to start reproducing exponentially, the thing that we drilled into their brains from birth. Don't be havin' no kids without brainwashing them into bringing you some grandkids later. But then comes the space, the quiet, the reinvention. If there are things you didn't deal with early in the marriage, they have buried themselves and then spring up later, like dandelion seeds. Maybe that's why so many people divorce late...stuff was hibernating in between all the bullet points and comes back later to bite you. Ken and I talked about our wedding, how every single married couple on that stage that day, except for he and I, are now divorced. Yes, the pastor, the associate pastor, the organist, the singers, all of them now kaput. That makes me shake in my boots a little bit, maybe a lot. Dear Lord, help us see what we need to see.  

We had the best of weekends, though it started out rough. The next morning we found ourselves in Jerry's Country Kitchen, at the bar, watching the well-oiled machine. I had a bird's eye view of the biscuit maker in the back. I showed her my praise hands, hands that have laid a lot of food on our table but never really learned to do the miracles she was making. I was struck with all the people working there, working so hard they didn't have time to sit down or hardly talk....but they were happy, cheerful and thankful for their customers. It was a beautiful morning, and a long, sweet weekend with more food (we spent more on a steak dinner than I've spent on a week of groceries); we sat by the Chattahoochee River in the twilight, held hands, saw a movie and ate at Cracker Barrel. I took a nap or two and still squeezed in a real estate deal. 

Love isn't always moonlight and roses, in fact it rarely is. There's a lot of thorns and rain to get those flowers. The true parts of love aren't ethereal things that possess and sweep us away, though I've been swept away many times over these fourty years. It's more like the ocean tide, where the ebb and flow of it, the seasons of warm, then cold, then seaweed, then glorious sunsets...all of it part and parcel of the whole. Love is an abiding place, a choice. It's much more complicated than that, and the truth is that only God's grace has gotten us this far. And I got lucky to have a steady, true-hearted man. Here's to fourty more.