August 9

On Monday we celebrated five years of marriage. That's both a long and a short time, depending on how you think about it. To satisfy my idle curiosity, I looked up what each anniversary is supposed to represent. You know, like fifty years is your golden anniversary. Well, gold is a long time coming. One year is paper, two years is cotton, three is leather, four is fruit/flowers, five is wood. (And for my in-laws, who celebrated their fortieth on Sunday, it's rubies.) This list is intriguing to me. Where did it come from? How many lives and experiences and handed-down folklore layered up over the years until it just came to be known that one year is like paper and five years is like wood? I like how the gifts become more substantial each year. I'm just hoping I can hold on until our sixth anniversary, which will be candy/iron. Now that's an interesting proposition for a gift.

My brother did our wedding video, and he did an interview section as part of it. It was done just a few days before our wedding. Every time we watch it, Levi likes to point out how I looked scared out of my mind. Sort of a deer in the headlights, "This thing is forever. Are we sure about this?"

That terrified look is how I deal with change. I worry about change. I worry too much about change. And then the big change is never as big or awful or life-shattering as I fear it might be. I did the same thing before both of my babies were born, too. I did it before I went to college. It's just my coping mechanism, I guess.

And marriage is both more difficult and more easy than I had thought it would be. And it's nice to have someone to face the hard things in life with. Someone who's obligated to listen to everything you have to say. (Except when I'm reading a book. I'm not to blame for my deafness when I'm reading a book.) It's even nicer to have someone you can share a comfortable silence with.

A while ago I found this editorial in the Boston Globe. It's a beautiful conversation about the shared language you develop in a marriage. The experiences that bind you together and the words you choose to define and remember the experience. We have those words, those inside jokes and phrases, together. And I'm sure you do. If not with a spouse, then with a family member or a friend. It's one of those intangible markers of a good relationship: being able to make the other person laugh without anyone else understanding.

And so, husband, after five years, after all the good and the bad, the happy and the sad, I'm glad I chose you. I'm glad we have built this life, with our cozy house and our beautiful babies, together.