Birthing Beautiful Ideas

six years of marriage, six years of laughter

Dear Tim,

Six years ago today, you stood next to me as we affirmed to our family and friends that we would be journeying through the rest of our lives together–officially, legally, and blissfully together.

Six years ago today, I had no doubts, no worries, no fears.  We held hands and uttered words like “forever” and “home” and “husband” and “wife,” and I felt at peace because I knew that my forever and home and husband would be you.

Six years ago today, we held the promise of our sweet Miles and Alec.  We didn’t know them, but we knew we wanted them.  We weren’t ready for them, but we knew we would be ready for them some day.  And we certainly didn’t know how much they’d expand our hearts and transform our love for one another.

Six years ago, we were in flux: between our single life and our married life, between Chicago and Syracuse, between youth and adulthood, between our known past and our unknown future.

Six years ago today, we were silly: we danced and sang and ate and drank and laughed, and you even had the bright idea to shove chocolate cake so far up my nose that it was stuck in my nostrils for weeks–an act for which I forgave you minutes later, once I was able to breathe again.

Six years ago today, we were humbled: to have friends and family who loved us to much, to have a celebration that expressed our love for them and that mirrored our love for one another.

Six years ago today, we had fights and fun and sex and life-changing moments to anticipate.

And six years ago, we were as we are today: best friends, admiring, adoring, and in love.

I love you ever more, six years later.

*

Yours,

Kristen

Before having children, spontaneity was something that Tim and I innocently, unknowingly squandered.

There were times when we would step out on a Sunday morning to enjoy, even savor cups of coffee.  Sometimes even while enjoying, even savoring a book or newspaper.  Like this.

There were times when we stop to get a bottle of wine on our way home from work and then spend the night getting tipsy and taking  silly pictures of ourselves.  Like this.

There were evenings where we could walk around the corner to our favorite restaurant without having to worry about coordinating childcare or a diaper bag or just enough snacks to hold our hungry child over until the meal arrived.

There were afternoons where we could have sex without worrying about waking up a baby or (worry of all worries) looking up to find a small child staring at us in confusion.

There were rock shows and neighborhood bars and mindless wanderings.

There were whims and fancies and last-minutes and unplanneds.

And then there were three.

And spontaneity seemed to happen to us.

Not whims or fancies or last-minutes.  (We were new–blissfully new–parents, and venturing outside of the home took at least one hour’s worth of planning and preparation.)

But there were unplanneds.

An unplanned wake-up call at 3 a.m.  And then another at 4 a.m.  And at 5:30.

An unplanned tooth arriving, just as we had gotten into a good sleeping rhythm.

An unplanned illness, an unplanned boo-boo, an unplanned diaper explosion.

An unplanned and profound joy as we witnessed first smiles, first hugs, first wonders at the world.

And then we planned.

And then there were four.

And spontaneity continued to find us–we did not usually find it.

Spontaneous labor, spontaneous feeding cues, spontaneous needs and wants and loves.

But still relatively (no, exceedingly) few whims and fancies and last-minutes.

Until yesterday.

Tim arrived home from work early, unexpectedly.

We had just enough time to dream up a trip to the science museum, to scramble to assemble our membership passes and shoes and snacks, to whisk the kids (and their peanut-butter sandwich halves) into their car seats, and to race off to COSI with just one hour before closing time.

We had just enough time to find spontaneity for ourselves for a change.

And like those long lost days of whims and fancies and last-minutes and Sunday morning savorings and evening wanderings, this newfound spontaneity was just as lovely, just as rejuvenating, and just as fun(ny).

M and Mommy watching a 3D documentary on whales and dolphins, while A and Daddy spent the hour splashing in the water table at the ocean exhibit.

K and J, just a couple hours away from welcoming baby Annie.

I had the opportunity–and the honor–to work with this couple while they brought their third baby into the world.  I took this photograph after witnessing this moment of profound and immense love between K and J–all while K was riding out pitocin-contractions on the birth ball!  With their permission, I’ve included it here.

I think we need to see more positive images of labor.  Not just ones where women are screaming furiously at their partners, but ones where the love between a woman and her partner, or her friend, or her mother, or her sister becomes deeper, and more profound, and more immense.

“Join me on the couch

for a movie, some cider

and cookies, Kristen.”

The Family Stone?!

Be still my heart, dear husband!

You are so sexy.

A couple of hours later, after we’ve spent a perfect snuggly December evening together, all thanks to Tim’s lovely ideas:

“My big Christmas wish?

The Millenium Falcon

Mini-lego set.”

Did I say ‘sexy’?

Star Wars Legos?!  Huh?!  Really?!

No.  No.  Not sexy.

My husband has what I have come to consider an endless, ever-changing slew of obsessions. 

These obsessions are random fixations, ephemeral-yet-passionate hobbies that consume both time and money and that leave me feeling everything from hilarity to frustration to pride to exasperation.

For instance, once Tim became so obsessed with amassing a veritable army of Criterion Collection DVDs that he needed to store some of these excellent-yet-expensive films in his underwear drawer since there was no room left for them on the shelves in our living room.  And so I intervened and put a stop to the obsession.

A couple of years later, Tim’s obsessions found him deeply in love with buying “in bulk.”  It was awesome at first.  Until one day, I found myself saying, “Dude, I don’t know what wild shenanigans you have planned for that vat of clam juice, but I think it’s high time you found yourself another obsession.”  And don’t get me started on the other vestige of his buying-in-bulk obsession.  Because I can see three mega-size bottles containing nearly 1000 Omega-3 fish oil capsules from where I sit at this very moment.

And now that Tim’s latest obsession–marathon-training–is waning, I see his newest obsession looming on our horizon.

I see it in all of its bright and shiny garishness, waving at us like a mechanical Santa Claus perched on someone’s front lawn.

Outdoor Christmas decorations.

The lights.  The ornamental candy canes.  The garland and bows.  The (oh God, please no) inflatable snowmen.  The (please, for the love of all that is lovely about Christmas, no) illuminated reindeer that simply beg for bored teenagers to pose in lurid positions.  The (please…I’m begging PLEASE NO, God we’re talking about YOUR SON here) cartoonish nativity scenes that make the baby Jesus look  like Ziggy dressed in swaddling clothes.

Don’t get me wrong, I do love me some Christmas decorations.  And I love seeing those decorations through my children’s eyes even more.  I just don’t want all of those decorations in my front yard for the entire month of December each year.

And why am I worried that the front yard may soon be the site of Tim’s latest festive, silvery, sparkling obsession?

You see, this is the first year that we have ever put up Christmas lights outside.  In prior years, our holiday time apartment-living and newborn care-taking and general laziness always sapped any and all desire to decorate the exterior of our home.

But this year, with our first house and no newborns in sight and a surprising gust of wintry energy, we decided to string up the lights with the best of them.

At first, I wanted to go for something simple, so I took a single strand of colored lights and wrapped them around a bush.  TA DAAAAA!  Lights!  Outside!  WE’RE SO FREAKING FESTIVE!!!

Then Tim decided that he also wanted to hang up the three strands of white icicle lights that my parents had given to us.

“Sure,” I thought.  “If it doesn’t take any additional effort on my part, then I’m all for it.”

So I didn’t bat an eye when Tim took a trip to Lowes specifically to get tools to assist him with hanging up Christmas lights.  I didn’t even balk all that much when I looked out the front window to see him wielding a very unwieldy ten-foot pole that he was using to hang up the lights.  I was even giddy when Tim suggested that we celebrate our newly sparkly home by taking a drive around the city to look at Christmas lights.

But it wasn’t until the aforementioned trip around Columbus that Tim’s new obsession began to reveal itself to me.

“So, Kristen, are you getting any ideas for what we can do next year?”

“Huh?  Next year?”

“Yeah.  The Christmas lights next year.  See anything you’d like to try out next Christmas?”

“Um, I dunno.  Some garland around the front porch?  A bow or two?”

“Well,” he replied,” I was thinking…”

He began talking about these colors for these trees those colors for those trees and illuminated reindeer and white lights vs. colored lights and large bulbs vs. small bulbs and ways to make rooftop light-hanging more precise and it was very clear to me that he had been thinking about outdoor Christmas decorations all freakin’ afternoon and that he wasn’t about to stop thinking about them any time soon.

Suddenly, the car whipped to the left, and Tim literally sounded as if he was out of breath as he begged me to “BRING OUT THE CAMERA!  BRING IT OUT!  TAKE A PICTURE, KRISTEN!  OH MY GOD!  WOULD YOU LOOK AT IT?!”

There it was.  A yard so festooned with Christmas decorations that the yard itself was nearly invisible.  Lights.  An electronic countdown to Christmas.  A cartoonish nativity scene with a rotating spotlight shining on it.  Santa on his sleigh with Rudolph and the gang, illuminated candy canes, dancing Christmas trees, snowmen and elves and reindeer and ornaments and gift-wrapped packages and, I kid you not, a gigantic inflatable Homer Simpson dressed as Santa Claus.

“Honey,” I breathed.  “I swear to God, if there is an inflatable Homer Simpson Santa in our yard next year, you’re gonna rue the day you were born.”

After attending our friends’ wedding yesterday, Tim and I have been reminiscing about our own nuptials.  We seem to do this every time we attend a wedding.  We talk about how lovely each other looked, about how delicious the cake was, about how magical it was to have all of our family and friends together in one spot, about how much fun we had during the celebration.  In fact, even during other wedding ceremonies, we often find ourselves silently repeating our vows to one another, squeezing each other’s hand every time the bride and groom utter their “I do’s.”  (Yes, we are incredibly corny, and yes, we are still in love.)

Somewhere about halfway down our tuxedo- and gowned stroll down memory lane, we reminisce about the event–the event–that left its most indelible (yet edible) mark on our wedding night: the cake.

the cake

The cake.

Weeks, perhaps even months, before our wedding, I had warned Tim that I did not want him to smash any cake in my face during the ceremonial “cake-swapping” tradition.  Although I am a playful and silly person through and through, having cake…well, caked on my face and possibly my dress did not seem like an enjoyable way to spend the reception.  So I reminded him, at the beginning of the reception, that I did not want to do the smashing.  Period.

But our dear Tim, strong of mind and heart as he may be, is also susceptible to peer pressure.  And his groomsmen–two of whom were good friends of mine from college–played the proverbial devil on Tim’s shoulder, convincing him that it would be hilarious to smear chocolate cake (with raspberry filling!) all over my face.  Obviously, none of them were married at the time.  Otherwise, they would have known better.  They would have known.

Now, you may think you know where this story is going.  “Oh, Tim smears cake on Kristen’s face and Kristen gets angry.  The end.”  But no.  No, that is not the story.

Again, before we joined hands and sliced that first piece of wedding cake with each other, I warned Tim not to smash the cake on my face.  I gave him the “evil eye.”  But I did this all playfully, and this may have been my mistake.  For Tim, dear sweet Tim, did not heed my warning.  He of little (husbandly) smarts proceeded to shove that delicious dessert right into my face.

Don't do it, Tim.

I was still able to laugh–genuinely laugh–as the chocolate crumbles grazed my chin and cheeks.  And I was still able to laugh–genuinely laugh–as Tim kept smearing the cake up and up and up my face.  And I was even still able to laugh–half-heartedly laugh–as the particles of chocolate touched the rims of my nostrils.

But then I couldn’t laugh anymore because there was so much cake stuffed up my nose that I was literally unable to breathe.

I’ve been told that the room went silent, but I was too focused on panicking since I couldn’t breathe with half-a-freakin’-piece-of-cake up my nose.  In fact, the more I tried to breathe, the farther the cake traveled up my sinuses.  And soon tears began welling up in my eyes–not because I was distraught (though I was) or because I was stunned (though I was) but because chocolate cake with raspberry filling really stings when it gets snorted up faster than a pile of cocaine at Studio 54.

Can't...breathe...

Everyone in the room must have thought that I was a prissy, humorless bridezilla because I quickly stormed out of the reception hall–again, not because I was so angry with Tim (though I was) but because I didn’t want to blow out a wad of snot-cake in front of 200 people.  (Just to give you some idea of how much cake I had inhaled, I was blowing chocolate specks into my tissues for weeks.  Yes, weeks.)

When I returned to my table  (after a few volcanic nasal-clearances), I discovered everyone at our table (i.e. our parents and siblings) was worried about Tim.  Yes, Tim.  The one who tried to feed cake to my brains.  The one who was five minutes late for his on-his-knees-crying-in-my-lap grovelling session.  The one who had been warned multiple godforsaken times not to smash the darned cake in my face!  (Okay, and yes, the one who had just legally bound himself to a sharp-tongued, potentially vengeful bride.)

The air was tense (and, to me at least, quite chocolatey).  I knew that something had to be done to defuse the situation.  I was not about to allow my wedding night to ruined because of an overdose of co-cake!

And so I did what only a super-bride could do.

I tapped my downtrodden husband on the shoulder and shoved a green bean up my nose.

The ensuing laughter gave way to an enjoyable, relaxed wedding reception…and, I must say, to a marvelous, loving marriage.  (Needless to say, that husband of mine sure is lucky that his sharp-tongued, vengeful wife has such a good sense of humor!)