Five years

This morning, I woke up, as I usually do, to Patrick getting out of the shower and rummaging for his clothes. Heaven-sent is the husband whose wife is allowed to marinate in bed while he gets dressed for work. Usually he makes a great playful show of trying to smack me with his belt, talks to the dog about something philosophical, and fills me in on the revelry that filled his prior evening. This is our morning ritual. There are familiar refrains, such as "Because you were being jerky," and, "But I'm a nice Plathy!" (He calls me Plathy.) This morning he informed me he was going to be wearing "Delmer-skin pants" to work, and proceeded to put the imaginary pants on, one leg at a time, accompanied by woofing sound effects. And I rolled over to hide my smile, and tried to remember what my life was like before I had a man in it who could make me belly laugh before 8AM.
I couldn't remember. I couldn't imagine that, as joyous as my single life could sometimes be, that it was ever as full with fun and humor as my life is now. And I was thankful.
Later, after I had gotten up and made tea, Patrick called from his drive to work to wish me Happy Anniversary. I had completely forgotten. 
Funny though, isn't it, those grateful thoughts that filled my head before I'd shaken off the sleep-grog enough to realize that it was, in fact, our anniversary. Half a decade. Half a damn decade. So much of the hard stuff is behind us, and so much of the good stuff is still ahead. I love that feeling. This morning, as I'm baking cheesecake and making sandwiches for our party, I am going to hold that feeling as present as I possibly can in my head. This marriage is good, and happy, and we are so lucky.

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