Five years ago:
I woke up at 5 am in a big hotel room squished into a bed with my two closest girlfriends. I couldn’t sleep, I was a ball of excitement, and wanted to fast forward the day till 2pm when I would be standing at the front of the church holding hands and promising our forevers. We ordered coffee to our room and sat crisscrossed on the big fluffy bed talking about the excitement of the day. I gazed over at my beautiful dress hanging there, and anticipated putting it on, and the look on C’s face when we finally locked eyes as I walked down the aisle. I watched the clock anxiously waiting for our (amazing) makeup artist to arrive, and fiddled with my ring envisioning what my hand would look like once the accompanying band was settled there.
Today:
I woke up to a sniffly toddler who had crawled into our bed sometime before 5 am, and was doing the starfish – arms and legs spread everywhere. I gently moved his heel from my rib and tried to snuggle in for a few extra minutes of sleep. Shortly after, his brother joined in and I was now wedged completely between two little bodies who took up more room than a sumo wrestler possibly could. After asking them nicely to lay still, telling them sternly to lay still, having P2 turn around and attempt to lay backwards in bed (kicking my ear in the process) and hearing my husband toss and turn I finally gave up and asked C to turn the morning show on. As the bright glow of the tv filled our room, we all covered our eyes and blinked in protest. For just a moment, there was still – and I reached over to C and said “happy anniversary, honey”…. and the world was good.
The morning went on to involve a little snippiness (mine), an attempted apology that involved a breakfast sandwich (though I later found out that a runny egg may have put a damper on that attempt, and on C’s shirt), the excitement of the tooth fairy visiting SG overnight, and a rainy walk to the bus stop. A morning so vastly different from that morning in 2006.
Five years. That seems like such a long time, and yet it doesn’t seem at all like it’s long enough for all the life we’ve lived in these 5 years. All the intense happiness, the questionable times, the persevering, and the love. We’ve loved A LOT in these 5 years. As I walked out of our bedroom I glanced up at the sign that sits above our door, a reminder from a reading from our wedding, and it felt so perfectly right. Despite what may come our way, and through the mundane of our every day life, our love will never fail. I love you, C. Happy Anniversary. May the next 5 years be even better than the last.

Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil, but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. Love never fails. 1 Corinthians 13:4