Happy birthday to this man

My husband's birthday was yesterday. In that picture, he is carefully replanting my terrarium while wearing an FDNY squad shirt our son gave him. Both those things speak volumes. They hint at why there is no one I would rather be with on this epic journey. My life with this man took on the promise of brand new experiences when our son proposed to his love this past weekend—a new stage of life is suddenly within view. Such a wonderful father my husband is, such a bedrock good soul, not a fickle bone in his body. Every day he gets up and puts in the hours, and every night, my spirits lift when he walks through the door. The intimacy of shared history, raising children, belly laughs, companionable silences, easy conversations, hard conversations, getting through, standing firm, all of it is a gift I do not take for granted. I am forever grateful that life gave me this man to love, a man for whom the most perfect birthday is to have his family around him, his children and their loves, and our niece who lives with us, and this is how we celebrated him last night, the stories flowing, random flights of conversation, traveling down musical memory lanes, side-splitting laughter, everything easy and good.