Take Three - or Leave Them

Three years ago today we got married.

Two years ago today we ate dinner at a French restaurant. I had almost refused to go ("I'm not eating anywhere today that serves french fries" I hissed), but was more than pleasantly surprised. We ordered cocktails, appetizers, soup, dessert and coffee. Dinner too.

A year ago today I sat at my desk, squinting at the computer screen. A half-written paper stared me down and the mess of my apartment piled up around me. Oliver came home around 9, produced a Swiss yogurt from a grocery bag. "Happy anniversary."

"I thought we agreed -- no gifts," I said (and laughed).

Today I left for school just as he was sitting up in bed. I returned late to a semi-dark apartment. Celebrate? Not today, unfortunately.

So our anniversaries haven't exactly been the stuff of legend. I can handle that. We don't do super-creative, romantic gifts and grand gestures. Really, it's not a problem. The things I really care about - honesty, love, friendship, selflessness - we have those in spades. Oliver is my other half, and not in a left-half/right-half way. It's more like a swirling mixture. We're two separate people, but blended in a way that you can't take a bite of one of us without tasting the other.

I like being married. I like being married to him. Two things I like best about the concept in general:

1) Your partner's dreams become your dreams too. And vice versa.

2)You have the chance to show one person, over and over for the span of your life, that his/her life is sacred. Everyone's life is. But do we all have someone there to remind us, make us believe it? I like being that person.

A year from today we'll probably have another forgettable anniversary. But the 364 days that precede it - I look forward to those.