Girl's Gone Husband

Two years ago today I met my husband. Partner in crime. Baby's Daddy.

Last year, I wrote a little something on ye olde blog and I decided repost one year later (today) because I was pregnant then, bedridden, grateful to be in love and I still am (grateful to be in love, not pregnant and bedridden.)

I guess wedding anniversaries are cool but for me, it's the day we met that always stands out. Seems to me a wedding is just another day, celebratory sure, but just another day. A meeting is much more. I am reposting this because I think with all the newness of being a parent we sometimes forget the newness of being in love. Whether it has been two years, twenty years, one hundred and sixty years... For me, I like to remember how it all started so I can remind myself when memories get lost in all the hustle of daily life, so I can tell Archer one day. Because even though love changes and grows over time, the stories of the past are whimsical valuables. They are as sure as the air we breathe, not to be discounted, stories to be retold and looked upon fondly.

I love you.

A Year in Review: April 5th 2005

It all started a year ago...

You walked into the coffee shop, grinning, pointing to the ceiling. A friend of a friend. We were all meeting for coffee. We had ideas. Always having ideas. "This is Becca." "This is Hal." "Nice to meet you." "Sure." Van Halen was playing a little too loud for a coffee shop. Van Halen was playing a little too low for a coffee shop on Melrose. It was our first time there. At 6:00 you can smoke in the coffee shop. We both were smokers so at 5:59 we lit up. We talked about a project. Something we could work on together. Our friend wanted us to meet because we had similar ideas. We would partner up soon after. We would do research on the weekends, watching movies on your couch and mine. I would cook you dinner and spill my wine, drunk and trying to impress you. I would fall backwards over the couch on my ass like a fool and you would ignore me and I would ask you if you wanted to watch My So-Called Life for research and you would play the guitar and say that it was time for you to go.

And I would chase you and bring you lunch and watch you while working. And when you picked me up one night and opened the door for me, even though we were only friends then, I knew that it wouldn't be long. So I called you and text messaged you love notes and you ignored them and asked what I meant by "this is crazy. Call me right now and tell me to come over." Because I don't play games and you like to be chased even though you never admit it. And one night you did call and I came. 3:30 in the morning but I didn't care and we smoked cigarettes by the pool in your backyard until you kissed me. I had been waiting an hour since I arrived. And before that- days, weeks... maybe even forever. And then we were together in the dark. "This was supposed to be a work partnership." "Oh well." And then we crept past your roommates, passed out on the couch and went to your room and I waited until the lights were off before I got into bed next to you.

And every day after that I came over to find you on your back by the pool, tanned in your bathing suit, guitar in the shade. And it felt like summer. Like being a kid and playing in the grass and staining my knees and sprinklers and the dogs that wrestled for your attention and my attention and how sometimes I would catch you looking at me and you would catch me looking at you and even though we couldn't see stars when we cuddled together outside in the night, we looked for them anyway.
And we went swimming and kissed in the shallow end and talked about liars and cheating and love and at the beginning we might have been apprehensive, even afraid that it would end up that way. What way? The way it always ends... with winter and how the seasons change, even when in a city like Los Angeles the weather doesn't.

And the first time I went away for a couple days, I stayed up all night and wrote you a love letter and even now, faded and torn, you keep it with you.

Months would pass and we would love each other, even when the tan went away and the pool was full of leaves and the dogs slobbered all over the couch I had kept clean when you came over. And instead of hiding embarrassing moments from you, I would share them and we would laugh. I wouldn't hold anything back. I would remove my makeup before bed and argue, seated on the toilet seat in my towel with mascara on my cheeks... Sometimes I would cry and burp without saying excuse me and you would follow me into the shower and tickle me until I couldn't breathe.

And every day was a surprise. You and me in the treehouse, which is what you called my bedroom because all you could see when you looked out the windows were the branches of the rubber trees in the street, overgrown and pressed against the windows. It was like a slumber party: smoking cigarettes in bed and playing truth or dare and falling asleep before dawn to the sweet hush of emergency sirens that passed every night, red lights washing over your face in sweet repose "Tell me a story, tell me a secret." "Which one?" "They are both the same."

And when I found out I was pregnant, and I showed up at your house with a purse full of Clear-Blue-Easy-peed-on-sticks, I was supposed to be coming over to do laundry but I couldn't get out of the car and you found me there, panicked and alone which was stupid, because I never was alone. Never when I had you. Never ever again. And you pulled me out with my head on your shoulder and we walked several blocks in the dark and I was shaking and you told me that you loved me and suddenly I was fearless. Of everything. Of being a mother and being with one person forever and of everything because I had a partner now, someone I loved. And when you said "we'll figure it out." I believed you.

And when I'm tired and won't stop cleaning the house and I can't figure out the medical insurance and the dogs want to go outside and "how the hell are we all going to fit inside this little apartment with one bedroom" and you tell me to relax and that you will take care of it, I shut-up. I listen. I lie down. I relax.

And every day I wake up and look at you and I can't believe it. And sometimes we drive past the coffee shop where we first met and you point to the sky and I think about smoking cigarettes even though I quit. We both quit together. Partners, for just over a year.*

*two, now.

hee.

GGC