That's us, back in the day, in a failed selfie attempt long before selfies were a thing. We weren't yet married, or even engaged. We were still brand new. Not unconnected to this, I'm sitting here musing on the fact that I was always a chubby, okay a fat child. In adolescence and for a bit into my twenties, I was what people might call “well covered.” In truth, I felt grossly fat, ungainly, but now I look back and wish I could be that size again, and I wish I'd appreciated it more. Having more girth, always, than the girls around me, who were all thin and willowy and effortlessly graceful, made me self-conscious in life, a feeling of being conspicuous in the wrong way that has persisted to this day. So I wonder sometimes that I should also be so lucky in life, to have met and married a man who is undeterred by my gains and losses and gains over the years, who treats me always as if I am simply me, the woman he married, and laughs with, and shares children with, who exasperates him sometimes, but with whom he has cast his lot, and is at peace having done so. We had a joking moment on the phone just now; he is at work at the museum and I am working at home, and after I clicked off the call, I just sat for a while staring out the window at the mid-morning light falling soft through the trees, and I just felt lucky.
And lucky you are. And so is he. This is your sweepstakes luck, as my grandad used to say.
ReplyDeleteMe too. You both are so amazing.
ReplyDeleteLove
I know the feeling.
ReplyDeleteActually, the feelings.
All of them.
Indeed. May I tell you that your relationship with your husband is complete #relationshipgoals for me.
ReplyDeleteWhen you shared about how you were fussing and fretting over getting ready for all your Thanksgiving company, and he simply put his hand on you and told you "it's time to get excited", well- that sealed it! Someone who lifts you to your higher ground, simply and surely. You two are so lovely.
The love you two share never fails to move me. This glimpse of the first days of your life together is a treasure. I see your beauty, your gracefulness, your trust in a man who proved to be trustworthy.
ReplyDeleteIn photos you have shown of your earlier life I have never thought that you were at all " overweight". You certainly don't look it in this one, though cant see much of you! I envy your close relationship with your husband.....something I have never known with mine of 44 yrs!
ReplyDeleteYou have a good man by your side and he has a good woman by his side. Who could ask for more?
ReplyDeleteI once read these words, "love knows no time," and I think it could also say no shape, no weight, no physical boundaries. Your hearts beat like mates forever no matter what. You two are so beautiful then and now.
ReplyDeletethrough thick and thin (hee hee, see what I did there?). those of us who have an enduring partner are indeed lucky.
ReplyDeleteI do tend to read your blog with great envy although i realize that everyone has problems. I am 54, singlw my whole life, no family alive. Precarious work so beginning a long process of retraining at a college a two hour each way transit commute each way. Loneliness ar most times
ReplyDeleteYour family, your connections are wonderful. Alas ww play the hand we are dealt.
This is a gorgeous picture. You are both gorgeous.
ReplyDeleteAnd I know what you are telling us. About the way we allow the world to tell us whether we are too much or too little.
Oh. I am so lucky too. Lucky that, finally, my spouse allows me my space to create, to cry, to live again those times which make me crazy..... And, I say finally because it has taken years and years for him to understand the problems of my youth, what I need to move forward and that what makes me angry sometimes has nothing to do with him or our lives together or how we now are.
ReplyDeleteyou seem like a very loving person so I would say your husband is the lucky one!!! You're both blessed to have such a Loving relationship!
ReplyDeleteThis is so beautiful and grounding. I thank you.
ReplyDelete