Better Living Through Literature
Words + Projects + Stuff I Like
1. It’s our anniversary! I met Doc 11 years ago at a fancy taco place and here we are doing legal paperwork and planning to buy a house together. We met later in life so statistically speaking we probably won’t have the 45 or 50 or 60 year anniversaries, but that just makes every year more precious. Happy anniversary honey! I love you.
2. It’s also the Spring Equinox. FINALLY. The light is back!
Ten years ago today, I met a guy at a friend’s birthday dinner who made a joke about the fish of the day. 3,652 days later, I am grateful every day for his example, his brain, his heart, his absolute generosity. Happy anniversary, honey. I love you more than bread.
A Decade
by Amy Lowell
When you came, you were like red wine and honey,
And the taste of you burnt my mouth with its sweetness
Now you are like morning bread,
Smooth and pleasant.
I hardly taste you at all for I know your savour,
But I am completely nourished.
Sunday was the seventh anniversary of meeting Doc at a taco restaurant and having him make a joke about the special…and reader, I FORGOT about it. He, of course, had a box of candy and a Joann gift card waiting for me, and I had nothing. I am a worm. A lucky worm.
I think it’s healthy to realize that just one person can’t be someone’s everything, but he’s as much as one person can possibly be: an extremely handsome man who wears clothes so well, the wittiest guy who can break out an Airplane quote at the perfect moment, a friend who wants to know all about my day, and a rock that I’ve learned it’s OK to need,
Everything I’ve learned about healthy relationships, fairness, and openness I’ve learned from him, and I feel like the luckiest of worms that I get to spend my days with him. I’ll take you out for our eighth, honey. I love you.
This week is also the anniversary of adopting Toby, prince among cats, who is living his absolute best life with everyone home right now. Every time I think about what this kitty has meant to me and helped me through, I can only think of my mom saying, “You and he are just really bonded.” Indeed.
(Photo by Doc, the only male Toby will permit to touch his head. What honor!)
Saturday was the sixth anniversary of Doc and I meeting at a friend’s birthday dinner. We talked about that night and the span of time since then and I jokingly said, “Thanks for staying on the emotional roller coaster with me.” Then I realized it had been a roller coaster, and how much had happened: the country went to shit after 2016, I started therapy and anxiety meds, we lost Mom, now there’s a pandemic and earthquakes and god knows what else.
Through it all, though, Doc has been there for me–being reliable, telling jokes, adjusting to things long before I do. He is my rock, which is a thing I would never have said before therapy. But thankfully I’ve learned that humans have evolved to need close personal connections. Having that need met doesn’t make you weak; it makes you lucky.
I say it every year, every birthday with him, but there hasn’t been another phrase that captures that feeling of winning the cosmic lottery better than Sagan’s: “In the vastness of space and the immensity of time, it is my joy to share a planet and an epoch” with him. Thank you for being there, honey. I love you.