My Anniversary, Rosy Thornton, and Love

So yesterday was my anniversary of being married to Amanda for 11 years, and for the 11th time, I woke up yesterday with a sudden humble realization of who it was that I had married.

There is a part of me that wanted to wait to write something about it, today. There are two kinds of people you remember in this world. I have a tendency towards the grand gesture, myself, and that puts me into one type. Living with me, on a day to day basis, is I'm sure immensely frustrating, because I'm really only good at these little stabs of kindness, flashes of very bright light as it were.

Over the last month, though, I've been reading a book Amanda recommended to me, a romance by Rosy Thornton called Crossed Wires. Usually romances depict the grand gesture, and so people confusedly think that the grand gesture is what healthy love is built on. Crossed Wires has in it no moment like this - in fact, the one moment that MIGHT have been a grand gesture ends up being a big mistake that muddles up the relationship for a while. Crossed Wires, instead, is the story of two people who fall in love over a stream of a thousand kindesses, a thousand tiny beauties that they notice in each other.

This is the kind of beloved Amanda is, which is why originally I wanted to wait until today to write about her - Amanda is not, to me, the wife of the anniversary or the birthday. When I think of Amanda, I do not think of bright moments punctuating the dark. Amanda instead is better, becasue hse burns steady and true all the time. Being married to Amanda is not like an Anniversary, where you are waiting for the moment when they do whatever it is they've planned, its comforting and continuous and immensely, immensely powerful, which is very different.

At the same time, now that I write my post up on the morning after my anniversary, I wish I had written it yesterday. I have a tendency to romanticize the unexpected - to, in fact, react to the steady, comforting stream of being loved by a saint by trying to make my little flashes brighter and brighter, so that hopefully they'll last a bit longer until the next time I remember to flash (and hopefully brighten up the muddle I make of loving someone day to day and being loved). The thing I've learned from being married to Amanda, though, is that love is about kindness, not about impressions. It's about comfort, not about roller-coasters. And the irony, of course, is that as much as I am confused, awed, sometimes even slightly frightened to realize how much my wife loves me, the more it makes me want to love better in return - Amanda makes me want to be unselfish and kind.

Yesterday, I ended up running errands for a big chunk of the day. One errand was getting my haircut. The hair stylist ws cutting my hair and asked me how I was, and my first instinct was to complain - it had been a long day, and one filled with lots of little worreis. IT's easy, and it's my tendency, to perceive life as a battle. But I realized that while I coudl recite lots of things that COULD be unpleasant things, that in fact, I flet very calm and quiet and happy - something that is admittedly not my most common impression. So I responded back, "Oh, I'm wonderful. Today is my anniversary." And I wished, very much that I was holding Amanda's hand. Here's to another year, and hopefully one where I can hold it more often, more steadily, more like Amanda holds mine.