My Romance...

 I was just out with the dog, bundled up against the ridiculous 35* F weather. (It was in the 80s last week. Thank you, Mr. Jet Stream.) I was thinking that this is romance for us. Seeing my husband with his lap full of bills, trying to figure out which doctors are going to get paid what this month, and taking the dog out, despite the cold and my hip/bladder/side pain, because it was the only thing I could do to help at the moment. Just like it was romance that my husband came out -in his tshirt and jeans, crazy man- to take the leash from me and make sure I was okay as soon as he realized what I had done.

Our weekend has been full of laundry, dishes, dinner with old friends, pulling a tick off the dog, watching a favorite movie (Death to Smoochy) because I was in too much pain to go to the drive in, clearance shopping, and plenty of time resting on my extra long heating pad. Don’t get me wrong, it’s been a good weekend, but I was thinking about a quote I read earlier. “You have your own story to tell, don’t get lost in someone else’s.”
 
I could spend (and lately have spent) days getting lost in other’s stories. Whether it’s watching Mr. Carson propose to Mrs. Hughes on Downton Abbey for the umpteenth time, reading fanfiction, binge watching more Acorn TV, Netflix, and Amazon Prime than is advisable, or reading silly inspirational romance novels (which are about as complex a written thing as I can follow with my pain-brain right now), I get caught up in lives that aren't mine, don't belong to me, and often that I wouldn't want to live.

I was thinking about all of this and then I opened facebook and saw that one of my childhood heroes died this morning. He was the stepfather of a friend from church. I only saw him occasionally outside of church and I haven't seen him in years, since they moved out of town. I'm not even sure I realized how big of an impact he made on me until I felt kicked in the gut by his passing. He was always such a happy, peaceful man. You felt better just seeing him smile. Even as a pre-teen just beginning to understand such things, seeing the way he looked at his wife with such love and devotion was an inspiration to me and an example of what romance could be.

That romance was evident to me in the giggles I shared with a woman at church who had broken both elbows, requiring devotion and a whole new level of intimacy with her husband of many years. It's the romance of my grandfather taking care of my grandmother and being so determined to keep her with him, even as a lifetime of memories they shared began to leave her. It's spontaneous trips for ice cream, laughing at inside jokes too silly to explain, and listening to my husband sing along to Crowder as he does dishes I was in too much pain to help finish.

So instead of a glib post about romance in the lives of a 30 something couple who has been together half their lives, I just need to put it out into the world that I am extremely grateful for my husband and all that he does. He is carrying so much weight on his shoulders, but he still goes out of his way to do anything he can to take care of me. That's more than enough romance for me.

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