Archive for the ‘The Past’ Category

Six years tomorrow, a certain boy and I began dating officially. You know, the way you’re dating after you have that SUPER awkward talk about where your relationship stands? Yea, that was 6 years ago tomorrow. And though it would be easy, I’m not going to write a huge post about all the ways that boy is wonderful (though he is) or how he completes me (he does), I just want to take you on a little tour of the past 6 years with that boy. With some really priceless pictures.

We met at a camp. On the first night of orientation, literally within 24 hours of meeting Slappy, I chipped my tibia, partially tore my achilles and ripped up a whole bunch of other stuff playing capture the flag and to my surprise, he, that silly boy in the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle shirt, was the camp EMT. After that night we began carpooling and one day he asked me if I wanted to go see Shrek 2, since all our campers had seen it. I had no idea it was a date until we were on our way home. And before long I found myself agreeing to another movie and then, on July 9th, in one of the most awkward conversations of all time, we made our dating official.

A year later, a year filled with fears and fun and graduation and med school applications, we celebrated our 1st anniversary at Disneyland, knowing that in less than 3 weeks, he’d be moving to New Orleans for medical school. I remember it being such a fun day, with a shadow of sadness. Which is not easy to see in the world’s worst self-portrait. But if you look closely, I’m pretty sure you can see my brain up my nose.

On July 24th, he moved to New Orleans. On August 30th, he came home after Katrina wiped away his school and much of the city I’d soon grow to know and love. He went to Houston in September and I didn’t see him until he finally came home for Christmas in December. We managed that year apart and in May, we packed up my apartment in California, stopped in Houston to get his stuff, and then moved into our house. It was terrifying and exhilarating. It was the beginning of the way our relationship would eventually be. Just us, no distances, no more moving. Just us. And really terrible humidity hair.

And while there we celebrated Mardi Gras

And medical school proms (where I swear I was wearing a dress, a really pretty one actually)

And where we planned a wedding. And then 2 years ago we flew to California, got married and began the rest of our lives together…in Hawaii. Okay fine, only the first 10 days were in Hawaii.

In that first year of marriage there were about a thousand ups and downs, but we fought hard, for each other and the tears and frustration were always worth it. And the love always won out. It was always stronger, always bigger than any argument, than any mistake.

In that first year, we celebrated major life accomplishments:

And we said goodbye to our fair city, to our home, to the place that gave us the distance from our pasts to let us grow into the people, the couple, that we are.

And we moved to California, nearer to our families, for jobs and school and though the milestones and accomplishments have been a little smaller so far, they’ve been celebrated too.

And most of all, now, after 6 years together, of learning each other, of understanding each other, of growing together and independently, I can say with great honesty, that I’ve never been happier than I am now. I’ve never felt more loved, more cared for, more special than I do now. I can’t begin to imagine what my life might be like if I hadn’t agreed to date that silly boy in the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles shirt. I can’t imagine if I had said no to the movie or if he hadn’t persisted despite my giving him no signals as the fact that I too, was totally smitten. I can’t imagine my life without his blue eyes, without his terrible sense of humor, without him. And I’m thankful every day that I don’t have to imagine.

And I’m almost as thankful that now, six years later, we’ve finally learned how to take self portraits. Kind of.

Maybe in 6 more years we’ll finally hire someone to capture some of these moments for us.

I’m going to go out on a limb here and tell a story about someone in real life. It might come back to bite me in the ass because some of my friends from college who occasionally stumble over here will probably immediately know who I’m talking about, but I’m kind of over that.

So on the first day of college orientation all the Freshmen met with some panel of officials and the students got to ask all those questions we had been wondering but hadn’t had any place to ask. A lot of weird questions were offered up and answered and it was actually a pretty helpful session.

Some guy up in the balcony asked, “What if we’re from somewhere like Buffalo and we can’t or don’t want to go home for Thanksgiving?” The panel explained that the dining hall would be open and that there would be some activities for those who stayed behind.

Maybe a minute later the same guy raised his hand and said, “What happens if you’re from somewhere like Buffalo and you don’t want to go home for Christmas vacation?” Of course everyone laughed, and I’m pretty sure the administrator just said that there really wouldn’t be any you know, heat or water or anything like that.

My memory is a little fuzzy, but I’m pretty sure he asked another question about how he never wanted to go home again and from that point on, he became known to us as Buffalo Bill*. BB became friends with some of my friends, simply by proximity. They lived in the same dorm and to put it mildly, BB has some space issues. You know, he wants to be in yours ALL THE TIME. He would go into peoples’ rooms and stay for incredibly large sums of time for no real reason. Never anything interesting, just needing to be in someone else’s metaphorical grill. BB is and always has been mostly harmless, but frankly, he’s obnoxious.

All conversations with BB go something like this:

BB: “Ugh. How are you? Don’t even ask about me.”
Me: “Good, thanks.”
BB: “I’ve had the worst day/week/month/year”
Me: ….(finally biting the bullet)…”why?”

And then there’s a 45 minute conversation about why his life is more difficult than everyone else’s.

And I listen, because truthfully, he’s had some bad things happen. However, at the same time, he’s SO freaking annoying. Everytime he signs onto instant messenger he starts the same conversation and eventually I find an excuse to leave the conversation, but not before he gives me a big fat guilt trip about being a good friend, and how it seems like I don’t want to talk to him and he’s just had so much of that recently he’s really frustrated. Hi, it’s because you’re ANNOYING.

Lately it’s been about teaching (he’s kind of a teacher) and he wants lesson plans from me for his classes. Or to complain about how busy it is. Or to tell me how little he’s being paid (more than me, for the record). Or to talk about how he thinks he got a warning from the administration because he’s homosexual (no, actually it’s because you were being stupid).

The pertinent part of this story is to tell you that I’m not inviting Buffalo Bill to my wedding, but I am inviting several other friends from college who know BB. How exactly does one go about this? I’m obviously not going to tell him that I’m not inviting him, but how do I not make this super awkward for people who know him and not be mean about it? I’m not a mean person and generally speaking I am a very loyal friend, but BB and I were never really friends, it was a host-cell/amoeba situation and I cannot get him to un-amoeba himself from me.

I really don’t want him at my wedding, but I also don’t want to be an ass. You know? Where’s the middle ground? Why can’t Hallmark make a card that says, “I hope you have a nice life, just not really near mine.” Or like, “You’re not invited to the wedding, but if it makes you feel better, I feel bad about not inviting you.”

Come on, you know you’ve had a Buffalo Bill you would’ve liked a card to send to. Admit it. Make me feel like less of a douche. No really, I’m going to need you to make me feel better about this. Or at least help me figure out what the hell to do.

*Not his real name, but I’m sure if you know him you’ll be able to figure out my super-secret code.