I wrote this on Valentine's Day last year I think, but I have no idea if I ever shared it. Where has the time gone and why is this so much more important to me than last year.
It is difficult to pick one day out that is "the best" when there have been so many. The day we had the picnic on the beach on Ocracoke. The day we walked down Turner Street hand in hand with the bagpipe leading the way. The day we ate that freezer-burned cake that had been sitting in the bottom of the freezer for the previous year.
They were all great days, but I am not sure which one is best.
The thing is, now that we are in year four together, I don't think I recognize the days the same way. There are the days we do the laundry together, while we sit in silence playing games on our phones. There are the days we go "long" shopping, where you roll your eyes as I struggle to make up my mind on which brand of horseradish I will buy. And there are the days when we both wonder what the hell we have done to each other and how we could be so cruel to the one we love so much.
We celebrated our first days together and played nice while our habits were still new and our behaviors still proper. But now that we have woken up together for the 1,153rd time, the habits have become common and the behavior not quite as proper.
I think I have broken a pledge that I once made in the warmth of our Spring together. I pledged to never take for granted the fact that you loved me. Now that we are entering into our summer, the heat of the 1154th day makes it hard to muster the energy that was so easy to muster when the dew was still wet on our bloom.
I have become complacent at times and for that, I bear such shame.
Perhaps if we had met when we were young, we might have grown together like wisteria that melds with the low hanging branches of the maple and they become one before they wither together under each other's weight.
People who marry young, grow old together and prop each other up with newfound strength they develop with time.
But coming together as we did, as full-on grown-ups, we must learn to bear each other's weight when we have only just learned to stand tall by ourselves.
Much like the oak that stands alone in the field, we have learned to bend with the wind and hold fast with our roots. But two oaks standing in that same field, compete for the sun, water and nutrients until one falls and takes the other down with it. The oak by itself cannot bear the weight of the other.
Are we, as the oaks, forced to stand alone because of our years waiting to find each other, or shall we while away making efforts to be the wisteria coated maple who die together? Or might we become our own creation under God's plan?
The days we have passed together were all amazing, but I can't say one outshines the other because they are all now gone. As adults who had a life before this one we have built together, we have so much to compare it to, and perhaps that is why we sometimes look so harshly at the days we have currently.
Memory is funny, such that over time, memories fade and melt into one another softly, compared to the unflattering light we shine on the present.
And so it is not the present days that I think are our best, nor the past that we hold so fondly. But instead, I think it is our future days that will be our best and I look forward to loving you on each one of them.
Happy Valentines Day My Love.
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