Asked and answered

He once introduced me as his “best half”, this beautiful boy of mine – long before we even decided to go all in, but also long after he ate all my nachos within the first five minutes of meeting him our junior year of high school.  It must have been somewhere along the halfway point of our twenty-year timeline.  It’s gone so fast.

I certainly can’t remember every day of the last two decades that we’ve spent together, but I can remember most things – the big things. The biggest thing - how he was there to hold our baby girl from the moment she fought to take her first breath until the moment her spirit took flight. How he held me up during the darkest days of my life – how he continues to hold me up - since then. How he wanted to ask my dad for my hand, and his insistence that it was the right thing to do, even though I’m slightly north of marriageable age…only slightly. Ok fine. Try doubling the age of consent in America....+1. 

Everyone knows we've been together a long time, but every dog has its day. I mean, every girl gets her day (IF she chooses. Not everyone wants the big party and the pretty dress and the cake and the live animals and French imported mimes, but I do. ALL OF IT. Thank you Pinterest.)

Anyway, he still has the ability to surprise me...even after all this time. 

You know what? Sometimes when we’re walking somewhere and he’s outpaced me by 100 yards because he claims it’s physically uncomfortable to walk at the speed I’m accustomed to, I’ll eventually spot the blonde and for a split second wonder who the hell the cute guy is that’s smiling at me. Early onset Alzheimer’s?  Sure, it’s a possibility. But the thousands of butterflies beating their wings against my heart in that moment? That’s not indigestion or even irritable bowel syndrome.

It’s love.

I love him. He, who still makes every day feel like a new adventure with millions and millions of possibilities for pure greatness (and exhaustion…he really does walk very fast). He, who my soul knows, and has always known. I like to remind him of the time we would have met in 6^th grade rather than 6 years later. He went to a mutual friend's birthday party, and had I just asked for a piece of paper and pen instead of overestimating my ability to remember important facts and figures/addresses and phone numbers, I would have been at that same party. Yes, probably reading a Babysitter’s Club book somewhere in an unoccupied room, but that was a really good book series.

It's all come together for us in the end, though. Something similar actually happened to my parents. A missed opportunity years and years earlier, but their souls eventually made the connection, and in a totally different country even. No wonder they’re my inspiration when it comes to marriage. They’re solid.

So here we are. Has it always been a smooth ride? Of course not. He drives me crazy (especially when it comes to our difference of opinions regarding what constitutes true exercise). But all in all, I wouldn’t have wanted to do this with anyone else. I can’t imagine my life without him. 

He and I made our Little Bird. I just wish we could have taken her along for the ride, too.

Twenty years.  It’s been a long while, yet not been enough, all at the same time. I hope we’re blessed with more.

Love, Light, and Ligaya - CS