So today is the day. The day that my husband and I celebrate our 4th wedding anniversary. Can I be honest? Today I’m just not feeling it. No digs to marriage or to my husband I just didn’t wake up in this love over me feeling. I know and pray that it changes but as of right now I am just glad for survival. Last year I was on the floor looking for my diamond that fell out because we had spent a year in the “Big D” land and I was upset and crying my eyes out.
Let’s revisit that moment. So I’m on my way to work and I notice that my diamond is no where in sight. My ring was empty. I was scared to the death to tell my husband but my anxiety took over and he was driving me to work and I had no choice. So as we both searched the car, I had to exit the car feeling sick and lost. All the petty arguments we had been having meant nothing to me at the very second that diamond was lost. It wasn’t the value of the ring that meant the most it was what it stood for.
Had I gotten to far into petty world to not care about my ring? Let me tell the story about the ring. I was proposed to by my husband in this elaborate scheme. He told me he had to take a business trip via train and he needed me to pick him at from the train station. Mind you I lived in another city so I had to drive up. He told me we were going to his uncle’s birthday party. He picked and told me he would take my dress to the cleaners. Nothing seemed out-of-pocket to me. He has great taste and this was done all the time. So as I pull up to the train station he gets in. We stop at the house and then we go to the mall. We needed to get our daughter some new shoes. We come home and we get dressed. We arrive at the location and I walk into the room I notice first my friends from college. All of my closest girlfriends from Penn State are here. I glance over and see my family and my best friend too. So I know at least my mom wouldn’t have been there for his uncle’s party our families just didn’t socialize together like that. So it was at that moment I knew something was up. Oh and the whole time we were running around getting ready my college friends were there too. I didn’t hear or see them but he had managed to arrange them to be in the actual house, etc.
So then the PowerPoint presentation comes on. It’s pictures of he and I over the years. Remember we met in 1999 so there some pics I hadn’t seen in forever. Well he then proposes and it was a magical moment. The ring was beautiful. It’s everything I wanted. When we dated before I told him how much I love a Tacori ring. They have very unique brands. This man got the exact shape of the diamond, the unique band and it was exactly how I drew it in 2000. He remembered. We hadn’t talked about rings even before the engagement. He just listened to what I said years ago when marriage wasn’t even on the horizon and made it happen. It took a few trips to several jewelers to put this ring together but he did it.
I felt like such a bad person. It wasn’t my fault that the diamond fell out. We had insurance but I felt like crap. I did the most basic of work when I got to my job. I was not in the mood at all. All I kept doing was crying and retracing my steps. I was just in such a funk. Everyone was like its okay you have insurance. It wasn’t about the insurance it was about a man who worked his ass off to get me what I wanted and I lost it.
I found the diamond the next morning on the floor. I had snagged it against my clothes and I was relieved. My outfit had severely loosened the prongs. He took it back to the jewelers to get it reset, enforced, and cleaned. I never wanted to feel that feeling again. As much as we had true issues in that moment I knew that I had to do my part to make this work. I didn’t ever want to take my marriage for granted. We both talked and decided to do what we had to do. Yes we have still had arguments but we have attempted to make them as less frequent. Although I’m not in a lovey dovey feeling as I expected myself to be in, I know that I still value my marriage. I am grateful that we made it through the storms and have the tenacity to move forward. There are good days and bad days and days where you think Lord, what in the world, but as long as you do what you need to do, the bad days seem to pass.
Today I am going to do what I need to do to get out of this blah feeling. However I wanted to wish my husband a very happy anniversary!! I know that I can’t go by what I feel right now. My husband has shown a lot of growth in ways I will never be able to write. He has stepped up to protect me in ways I didn’t think he would. We have been through some of the most extreme of situations. Things only a person could read and say why are they still together. We have loved each other since we met August 17, 1999. It was that one chance encounter that sealed the deal for us. We are friends. It’s what we revert to when romance is on the edge. Its what we stand by when we want to walk away but we know that we will be right back to one another when the storm passes. There is such a respect there and I appreciate the ride that these 4 years have given us but I look forward to the new memories that number 5 will bring. I pray blessings upon blessings for this new year!!
