Challenge - Day 18: "Someone You Love"

Someone I love -- it's a hard choice for me to make. I don't like to toss the word "love" around too easily. You're probably much the same. There are friends I like, some people I love and then there are those I really love deeply. Some of them are family, some are friends, but all have affected my life and touched me in an important way. With that criteria I suppose there is no one who has affected my life more or who I love more deeply than my husband, Scott. 

Do you ever drift away in thought and imagine what your life would have been like had you taken a different course somewhere along the road? I do that sometimes when I think about meeting Scott and getting married. I first married at nineteen, a relationship which lasted only three years, about the time they say it takes for all those attraction hormones to fade away. Did you ever notice how many marriages end after three years? Anyway, I stayed single a long time, until my mid 30s. I had decided that I probably would never marry again and was more or less happy with that. Then Scott came along. Isn't that the way it always goes? He just blew me away. I wrote a post earlier about how well he could read me, how he knew things about me that I kept hidden in the safe. He was also the only man I had known, other than my Dad, who really worked hard to please me. He was always doing some little something for me. Something that showed he was paying attention, that he was watching when my eyes lit up or heard my voice rise a little with excitement. How irresitable is that, I ask you?

I remember the first time I was away from Scott for any period of time after we married. I had traveled with my two sisters to Prince Edward Island, Canada. My sisters are older than me and both married young and stayed married for a long time. They were looking forward to a little break from husbands and children and there I was, moping around because I missed my husband. They both said, "Just wait ten or twenty years; you'll be ready to travel without him then." I can't say they were completely wrong. I do like to visit my friends and have "girl time," but even when I'm having fun, in my heart of hearts I wish Scott were there. He is my perfect traveling companion still, after all these years.

And he still works hard to please me, even now there's no doubt he won me over. When he goes to the grocery store he checks the floral department to see if they have that perfect shade of coral rose I like and, if they do, he brings them home, just because he knows they will make me smile. On those days when I'm working away from the house and he's been at home he will make dinner and have it ready for me when I come in, just because he knows I'll be tired and won't want to cook or go out again. He keeps refilling my water glass on the bedside table when I'm there watching TV or playing around on my iPad, just because he knows I need to drink more water and won't get out of bed to get it myself. 

So when my mind drifts away to "what if," I really can't or won't think of my life without him. We've been through losing a child together, maybe the worst situation a marriage can face. Statistics show that either marriages get stronger after the death of a child or they end; there's very little in between. I feel like we're both broken people and can't be whole without the other. He's the only one who always knows what certain days mean to me, what memories certain songs or phrases exacerbate. He knows when to leave me alone to let me deal with things and when to whisk me away and take care of everything for me. I love him for that and for all the other ways he keeps my life going. He is special. My friends know this, too. I have one single friend who says, "Maybe one day I'll meet my Scottie." He's their benchmark for husbands. Aren't I the lucky one?

Thanks for stopping by today.