I'm not gay, but we have a change of plans

Tomorrow morning I was going to get on a plane and head for some sun and fun with my sister in Hawaii; Ian was going to take the kids out of school for a couple of days to go skiing. But then we overheard the kids talking and realized they wanted to send real time with their dad, not time spent on the slopes, and then yesterday we had to decide quickly what a tsunami headed for Hawaii might mean for my trip with Nika.

The airline was willing to refund and the hotel, if we decided right on the spot, was willing to give us vouchers for either a future visit there, or for use at another of their hotels, so we decided to cancel.

I assumed that meant that we'd reschedule for later this year, but Ian still wants us to go do something this week. Nika took the time off work, and the only other time she'll get later this year will be for her wedding, and once fall rolls around she'll be in school on top of working. We either go now, Ian pointed out, or we might not go at all.

Last night was a flurry of phone calls, trying to decide where in the U.S. we wanted to spend a few days. The only criteria is it has to be warm. We narrowed it down to a couple of places, and when we just couldn't decide, my brilliant father coughed up the solution.

Flip a coin.

So based on the turn of a quarter, we're going to Las Vegas. And honestly, I think we're going to have more fun there than we would have in Hawaii. Ian made all the arrangements this morning, and after we take the kids to school in the morning he's taking me to the airport where I'll meet Nika, and head off for whatever trouble we can get into without the guys around.

I felt bad that Ian switched his plans around, because he really did want to take the kids skiing, but he doesn't seem to mind pushing that back for a week. The kids have scheduled his afternoons from the time they get out of school until bedtime, practically, and none of it revolves around dance lessons or the dojang. And he does have a few things he keeps putting off that he can use the time to get them done, and one of them, against my initial resistence, is finalizing a potential job for himself. It keeps him marginally in his field, but it's not full time unless he turns it into full time, and he can work from home; I can't fight him on that. It gets us what we both want; he's working, but I have him home.

We'll see how it goes.

Things I learned yesterday

Boobs are not puppets, and women don't appreciate it if you treat them like they are, especially not with goofy voices, and especially not with her father in the house (though I would have refrained if I'd known he was there; he's a sneaky bastard and showed up while I was taking a shower.)

Things are only made worse by insinuating to her father, even in an off-handed kind of way, that his daughter has some very specific talents; he might appreciate that, but that doesn't mean she wants him to have any idea what she likes/doesn't like/is especially, incredibly, overwhelmingly good at.

After two royal blunders within an hour, it's really stupid to joke Woman, make me a sammich, because she will, but it will be your least favorite, and she will threaten to stuff it down your throat.

Never, ever, even remotely, minutely, infinitesimally agree with her when she mentions she feels like she's gotten a little curvier, even if you say it in a way that suggests you like those curves. Don't offer to show her how much you like those curves, either, because you've already blown it and that just makes it worse.

If she gets mad enough to call you a dick, slams the door in your face, takes the kids grocery shopping after school instead of coming straight home, then tells you that you're not having dinner at home but you're going out with your friends because she has arranged a playdate for her most immature child, you've overstepped the line badly enough that a simple apology isn't going to cut it.

If, when you get home, she's soaking in the bathtub and the kids warn you to not go in there, go in there anyway. Just take a bottle of wine, a single glass, and a handful of dark chocolate; then apologize, offer to make hot chocolate for everyone when she gets done soaking, and then don't stop apologizing until she probably wouldn't mind if you turn her boobs into puppets.

But don't do it, because one way or the other, that will come back to bite you in the ass.

So you don't think it's 24/7/365 Mushdom here:

At 6 this morning, she really liked me.

At 10, she was annoyed with me.

At noon, she tossed a sandwich on the table and told me to eat it or else.

At three she stormed out of the house to get the kids from school and specifically did not want me to go with her. They should have been home by now, but I suspect she dragged them grocery shopping with her instead of coming straight home.

No, I didn't do anything particular; I was just being me, which is, honestly, not always the wisest thing to be.

Kind of surprising she doesn't want me to get a job and get out from under her feet more.

Because I'm gay, we have a change of plans

There's a room between ours and the first of the kids' rooms; that buffer was intentional because we realized sound would carry in this house, and there are some things we don't want the kids to hear, obviously. On paper the room is a den, ideally the room is a home office, but in reality it's where the kids sit when they indulge Kevin when he wants someone to play a board game with him. Last night, while Char and I were sitting on our bedroom floor (I was helping her stretch, which she still needs to do daily, so don't let your brain go to the kinky places) they were in the den playing Scrabble, and without intending to we could hear what they were talking about. And the gist of the conversation went something like this:

Kevin: I'm gonna miss Mom.
Rachel: We'll still have fun.
Kevin: But it would be more fun if Mom was going with us.
Alex: No shit. You know Dad's not going to have as much fun as he thinks he will.
Rachel: Why not?
Alex: Because he's so damned gay for Mom that he'll be mopey.

They had more to discuss, but the end result was realizing that they really don't want to go skiing next week. It's partly because they're worried I'll be miserable the whole time, and partly because they won't have as much fun as they would if their mother was going to be there. And they're probably right, to a point. I'm certainly going to miss Char while she's gone, but I don't think I'll be miserable, and I do agree that we all have a better time no matter what we're doing when she's there. None of them wanted to tell me any of this to avoid hurting my feelings; they like the idea of having time alone with me, but they would prefer we did things close to home. Bowling, a movie, just hanging out.

You know, things where we can actually talk to him.

We wouldn't be doing a whole lot of talking while speeding down the side of a mountain.

So we're changing plans. I didn't tell them I overheard their conversation; instead I asked them if they minded if we delayed the ski trip, because I have a few business related matters to deal with. That's not a lie; I do have some investment matters to attend to and a publisher to contact regarding some potential editing work. Char will be back on Friday, and Kevin's birthday is the following week, and why not make the trip with his birthday in mind?

They're happy with that; Char is happy with that; all I wanted was to spend some time with my kids, and I'll get that no matter where we are. So they'll go to school and skip the dojang and dance classes altogether for a few days, and we're just going to hang out, go bowling, have dinner in places Char normally says no to, and anything else they think they want to do.

Early Monday morning Char, the kids, and I will pile into the SUV, and head for the airport. She's headed off to Hawaii for a few days with her sister, and the kids and I will head off for three days of skiing and whatever trouble we can get ourselves into. Our original plans were to hang around the house after school and live on pizza and Trix, but then a friend mentioned going skiing, which made me ponder us taking the kids when she got back, and she mused that I might as well go while she's off drinking mai-tais with Nika.

I was frankly surprised when she agreed to me taking the kids out of school for a couple of days just to ski, but there's a method to her madness.

If I take the kids skiing, I can't surreptitiously go job hunting while she's gone.

She's still determined to keep me home and unemployed. While neither of us has tired of the togetherness yet, I keep thinking that sooner or later I'll need to do something to get out of her hair for a few hours a day, or she might start feeling a little homicidal. I know I'm not the easiest person to live with; one would think that being stuck with me for virtually 24 hours a day would be pressing on her last nerve.

I get why she's in no hurry to send me back out into the rat race; these days I'm a much calmer person, I don't fidget as much as I did even just a year ago, and I sleep. She doesn't have to wonder how long I'll be able to sit still if we're watching a movie with the kids, she knows I'm paying attention to what she or any of the kids are saying in a given moment, and if she wakes up in the middle of the night she can be pretty sure I'll still be in bed. If I'm not, she can be pretty sure I just got up to go to the bathroom.

She has the mostly normal husband she thought she was getting fifteen years ago and doesn't want to give that up.

I get it.

I also get that neither of us is exactly ready to spend large chunks of time away from each other. Until this weekend, I don't think either of us quite grasped that, not until it was bluntly pointed out to us. While we were lying in bed last night, Char confessed, upon advice from the friend doing the pointing, that she wasn't sure she really wanted to take this trip to Hawaii just yet. Maybe in a few months, but not now.

I had to admit that I'm not all that keen on the timing, either.

But she has to go. No, it's not the money already spent on tickets and hotels, and it's not the time Nika took off work to go. She has to go because if she doesn't, she'll regret it. And delaying the trip isn't going to make it any easier on either of us, because if she pushes it back a month or two or ten, we'll still have to face the enormous weight of being apart for the first time since her accident.

You're clinging to each other, our friend pointed out.

And she's right. After the horror of last summer, neither of us is ready to let go at all, but we have to. I'm not letting her back out of this trip because as badly as she doesn't want to go without me, she needs to. As much as I want her skiing with the kids and me, I'll take them alone and try to distract myself from all the what if thoughts.

Once she's there I know she's going to have a great time soaking up the sun, getting slight blitzed, and probably flirting with random guys who don't realize they won't have a chance with either of them. Once the kids and I are on the slopes, I know my gut won't be churning so hard worrying about every horrible thing that could happen to her while she's gone. I'll have a blast spending this kind of time alone with my kids, something that doesn't happen very often.

We'll get through the trepidation, and then maybe (maybe as in a long shot), she'll be a bit less reticent about the idea of me working, and I'll be a little more willing to push the point.

Mostly, we're both going to have a kick ass time.

Tonight's 3am gem:

He woke me up with his mumbling, but he got my attention when he slapped my ass and said, "Paper covers rock!"

I'm giving him half an hour to get out of whatever game he's dreaming about, and then waking his ass up.

If I'm awake, he deserves to be, too.

Why we should make sure none of the kids are awake when we come back from a night out:

Ian, just a little tipsy, throwing the door open: "I didn't mind. I like it when you beat me."

Alex, from the couch: "Holy shit. Really? I'm right here."

Ian: "Well, next time you can come and watch."



(For the record, he was talking about losing to me at nine ball 13 games in a row; Alex, on the other hand, has a typical 14 year old dirty mind.)

I think I've said before, Char and I don't fight often. We either agree or let things go, and when we argue it tends to be over stupid things. Like laundry. But today she posted a picture on Facebook, and I let my temper get the better of me. We had one of those fights that doesn't even require words; the tension in the house was thick enough the kids were uncomfortable, and I went to the dojang to avoid letting it get any worse.

From the outside, my upset over having that picture posted online seems petty, but I have my reasons. Char knows what they are and she understands them. For the most part she agrees with them. So when I logged onto Facebook and saw it, I was not happy and I let her know it.

I'm an idiot, and I overreacted.

They're her kids, too, and she has every right to share them with her friends. My paranoia is my own, and I can only inflict it on my family for so long. That doesn't mean I'm about to open up, it just means I recognize that I'm a little too tightly wound where some things are concerned.

And I apologize to my wife if I embarrassed her.

We taped the men's Olympic skating last night so that Kevin could watch it; Alex had told him it would be like dance on ice, so he wanted to see it. This morning, knowing the results, we let him watch Evan Lysacek's performance before leaving for school, and for most of the ride it was this:

How did he know where the walls were so he wouldn't run into them? How hard does he work out? Is the jumping part hard? How come he doesn't fall when he comes down from a big spinning jump on just on ice skate? How many years did it take him to learn how to do that? Does he get to pick his own music? Do you think he knows about ballet and dancing? Does he get to meet a lot of girls?

Char finally sighed and turned to say, You're not taking skating lessons, Kevin.

He wasn't interested in the idea of learning to skate; he is just a curious kid who sees how the skating he saw can parallel the dance he's interested in. As soon as he was home from school he watched the rest of the competition, and sat there riveted. I mostly watched him watch, and realized that where I see a guy in a questionable costume flitting around the ice, he sees beauty and grace.

He watched through the medal ceremony, and mused that that blond guy looks really upset that he didn't win.

I had to agree; Evgeny Plushenko stood on the podium looking like he was chewing on sour grapes.

He was good, but he wobbled a couple of times and the guy that won didn't.

I wouldn't know a wobble from a transition on skates, so I just agreed with him.

What a douche.

That's my boy.

My great-nephew-slash-grandson turned one today, and to abate his older sister's horror at the idea that her baby brother was too young for a “real” birthday party, everyone met at McDonald's. McD's won out over other suggestions because it has a playground! and it was the one place Erin and Miko knew the kids wouldn't wind up whining to leave after twenty minutes. Fifteen minutes after getting there Toni and Kevin were in the playground, and luckily Rachel and Alex didn't mind watching them.

It beats, Rachel said with a perfected teenaged dramatic sigh, watching Travis mangle his chicken nuggets.

(As they wandered off, Char mused that it also beat watching Alex inhale two Big Macs, and she didn't want to contemplate how many fries he would consume before we left. She tried bribing the kids to keep them from actually eating anything there, but they're not stupid; they know when to take advantage, and there was no way she would forbid it if everyone was there for Travis's birthday.)

Travis is a kid that loves to eat, but give him a chicken nugget and he will sit there and methodically peel off the coating, set it aside, rip the nugget into several pieces, and then slowly eat it piece by tiny piece, saving the coating for last.

Give him a box with four nuggets, and you assure you're going to be there a while. Give him a few fries, and you have peace and quiet for at least forty five minutes.

He was into the third nugget when Kevin dropped onto the booth next to me, bemoaning the idea that he's gotten too old for the playground. It's not fun anymore, and it smells like pee. Toni came after him, begging him to go back and play, and he relented, but with a look that said You owe me for this.

From where I sat I could see Alex and Rachel sitting at a table in the playground area, side by side, practically leaning against each other, and I couldn't help but be struck by the realization that my sister and I would have been on opposite sides of the table, and if we'd actually touched, one or both of us would have been complaining about it. My kids were laughing together (probably about their parents) but I would have sat there in stony silence with my sister, watching whatever kid we were in charge of, and resenting that I had to be there in the first place.

My kids are already better people than I was at their age.

By the time Travis had finally finished eating, Kevin and Toni were done in the play area and ready for ice cream and cake; the birthday boy was more interested in feeding finger-smashed chunks of cake to his mother than he was in eating any himself. I have to give Erin credit, she never flinched, and that's one thing that used to mostly turn my stomach when the kids were little. Spit-riddled, finger-smashed, sticky cookies and Cheerios grossed me out and still do; she let him shove cake covered fingers into her mouth without blinking.

It never bothered Char, either, so I'm considering the possibility that it's a maternal thing.

On the way out to the parking lot I realized my niece, who is due in early May, looks like she's closer to 8 months along than 7, but I forgot that if you think something like that you should keep it to yourself, or the pregnant woman will swing her 50 pound purse at you while shrieking I am not having twins! It's just a big baby! Now, I didn't say anything about twins; I was considering that she was further along than supposed, but I think now she's doomed herself.

I kind of hope it's triplets, just because she actually connected with the purse, and smacked it into my still bruised ass.

In any case, Travis turned a year old today; he's making motions of wanting to walk, and as much as everyone wants to see him take those first steps, I know too well that once they get started, they just keep on going.

It feels a bit chicken-little-like to be worrying about Alex's classes over the next couple of years. We know that one way or the other things will resolve; I think we just resent being put in this position in the first place. We're also worried about what this forebodes. They're cutting some very important classes, so what's next? We know a tuition hike is coming next year, more money for fewer educational opportunities for out kids, but will anything else happen? Will the school even survive? Next year we might be looking back laughing at ourselves for getting worked up over this, but I think we both worry that this might mean more than just an inconvenience in transporting Alex around and a few more dollars being spent to cram more into his brain.

For right now, Alex is excited about the idea that he'll be taking a few classes at the community college, and if we leave it completely up to him, that's what he'll do. He's pointed out more than once that Evan will have his driver's license in November and that would only leave us inconvenienced for a couple of months, but he doesn't want to admit that just because Evan has a license that doesn't mean he'll have a car, or even permission to be their driver. To their credit, neither one wants to test out of high school completely; they don't want to miss out on everything that will go on during their senior year, and left unsaid is that they don't want to leave their girlfriends behind.

If this is the way we go, and the more we talk the more likely it seems, Ian will probably use it as an opportunity to take a class or two, rather than making the drive to pick the kids up, drop them off, then go back two hours later. If he does, I pity the teachers, because I suspect he is one annoying student to have.

You know how nerve grating it is when people brag about how smart their kids are, especially when it's couched in complaints about it? That's exactly what this sounds like. We have a kid with brains, and it poses problems for us every now and then, and right now, the needs his intelligence creates is problematic.

He started out in the public school system, until his teachers basically threw their hands up and asked us to move him up a grade (something he didn't want to do) or home school him (something we didn't want to do.) At the same time, he was bored out of his mind, and was starting to hate school. The grade school had no gifted program; quite the opposite, the more we poked into it the more we realized not only were they teaching for testing, they were also teaching to the slowest kids in the class, leaving behind the kids who were average or slightly above average. We made the then painful (for Alex) decision to pull him out of the public school and enroll him and Rachel into a parochial school. They had the programs he needed, and looking beyond grade school, if he continued on the pace he was at, they would have the classes he would need in high school.

It's not cheap. The tuition for this school for three kids is like buying a new, nicely-loaded car every damned year, but we've always justified it as worth it because the kids are getting a very good education. We often refer to the school (not quite fondly) as Our Lady of Perpetual Hands Out, because on top of the tuition they're always asking for donations to fund non-academic programs, like drama, band, choir, and sports. We've donated every year we've been asked, because those things make up part of the school experience we want our kids to have. Rachel and Kevin participate in choir. They all go to see their friends in drama. They cheer on the sports teams.

A few days ago Char and I were called in to see Alex's counselor; the gist of it is that as of the end of this school year they're losing (getting rid of) most of their advanced academics. Enrollment has dropped and cuts have to be made. For Alex this means that some of the classes he would have taken, calculus, advanced biology, chem 2, physics, and trig, will no longer be available. What the school wants us to do is enroll him in the community college part time so that he can still take those classes, and leave him in the high school part time to finish up the required classes he needs to graduate.

There is no part-time tuition for this school; if he's there for one class a day or six, we're still paying the full tuition.

Theoretically, he could test out of every class he needs and graduate early. Realistically, he's a very social kid and needs to be in school with kids his own age. He needs to be around his friends, and he needs to have as much of the high school experience that he can. He's just started dating, and he should have the chance to get to know as many girls as he can if he wants; I don't think that option will be available to him if he leave high school too early. I don't care how damned smart he is; he deserves what's left of his childhood.

The past few days most of what Char and I have discussed in private is what to do about this; we don't want to do the wrong thing and we're not 100% sure what the right thing is. Yesterday Char was on the phone with Evan's mother finalizing plans for the boys' Valentine's day dates, and realized (because, hell, we're just not as smart as Alex is) we aren't the only parents grappling with this. Evan's parents are also trying to decide what to do; pull him out, send him to the community college, or both. This is especially problematic for them, because they both work and can't take off in the middle of the day to pick Evan up from one school and take him to another.


It was an excuse to meet with Evan's parents for lunch today. There are undoubtedly other kids in their class affected by this, but for now we're focusing on these two and what we can do for them. They shared our concerns about a social life for their son; he's a little older than Alex but has been very shy and has only recently worked up the nerve to speak to girls. They're afraid that if they pull him out of school that he'll never get past the shyness that has until now held him back. He's learning confidence from his friends; remove him from that environment and his foundation crumbles. None of us want our kids to look back and have regrets about what they missed if we have them test out and move on.

Yet, these boys have post high school goals that require having those advanced classes. I am annoyed at having to pay full tuition for Alex to take just a couple of high school classes, and then piling more tuition on top of it. But annoyed is all I am; Evan's mother works solely to pay for his tuition, and finding the funds for college classes and books on top of that is expecting nearly the impossible.

Granted, the changes don't take place until next fall, but we all have to decide soon, because they have to take placement tests for math and science in order to secure enrollment. Evan's parents need to secure financial aid. And none of us want our lives to become reduced to being a student taxi service, but that may be where we're headed, until one of the boys gets a driver's license.

Granted, too, unless I win the battle of Will Undr Get A Job* before then, Char and I can jockey the driving of kids around, and if we're hauling Alex back and forth we can haul Evan as well, but it will be a giant pain in the ass, and I think we all resent being put in this position.

*a battle I am currently losing.

Valentine's Day is usually on me; sexist or not, I tend to pick what we do and where, and I typically like to surprise Char with something I think she'll enjoy. I made plans for this year, something I thought would be romantic but not over the top, given her dislike of expensive fine dining. Erin said she would watch the kids, given that Miko is out of town and Brad has plans of his own.

I hadn't factored Alex into the equation, though. He obviously doesn't drive, and this is his first Valentine's Day with a girlfriend. We still could have proceeded with our plans and driven him and Stephanie where they wanted to go and then picked them up, but Char overheard him talking to Evan, and realized the boys were debating three choices. They could get their girlfriends gifts, or take them out to dinner, or to a movie, but with limited funds they had to pick one, and that seemed "kind of lame."

We just celebrated our anniversary, Char pointed out to me, and we did it right with the trip and all, so if I didn't mind, she had an idea to present to Alex, and if he went for it, that meant we weren't going anywhere.

I wasn't thrilled with it, but I have more options and cash than my son does, and Char doesn't mind putting off our plans for later.

And Alex liked her idea.

Char wanted to cook for them; we'd set the table using the rarely-used china, silverware, and light candles, and she would cook something special for them. We would serve. And once they had food on the table, she and I would leave them alone, hiding in the back of the house (with the right to wander in unannounced at random intervals.) Rachel and Kevin could go to Erin's and play with their cousins, and Alex and Evan would be able to buy gifts for their girlfriends and treat them to a nice dinner.

So tonight, instead of taking my wife out and potentially getting to do things to her in the back seat of the car, I drove Alex to pick up Stephanie, Evan, and his girlfriend. Char decorated the dining room for a definite Valentine's dinner and had the mood lighting set and music on when I got back with all of them. And now we're sitting in our bedroom, waiting for the lull in their laughter and conversation to cue me into driving the kids home, which I don't expect for a couple more hours.

I can't really complain, other than not being able to cave into my impulses right now. Alex is probably having a good time, and I got to have pizza on the bed.

Whatever it takes, baby

Happy Valentine's Day

Alex needed a ride to the mall, Rachel wanted to tag along, Char wanted to shop for clothes for Kevin, and somehow that meant he and I had to go. While Alex and Rachel went off together, Char dragged us from store to store, and in the fifth one Kevin looked up and me and asked earnestly, Dad, what are we being punished for?

I had no reasonable answer for him.

We caught up to the other kids near a jewelry kiosk, where Rachel was warning Alex to get his girlfriend a necklace instead of earrings; a necklace box is obvious, she told him, but an earring box can be mistaken for a ring box, and it wouldn't be fair to make her think she was getting something she wasn't, and if she thought it was a ring she'd would be wondering what the hell it meant.

Valentine's Day was a lot less complicated when I was their age. A card and candy, or a card and a rose, and you were covered, and no one worried about any potential hidden meanings.

He couldn't let her be right; be bought a (very nice but not expensive) ID bracelet and had her name engraved on it, which prompted Kevin to roll his eyes and tell Alex he was dense.

Duh. She knows her own name.

I can't argue with his logic.

For years Ian did not sleep well or especially deeply. We usually crawled into bed at the same time, but once I was asleep he got up and quietly played around online or read; if he fell asleep, he inevitable woke up an hour or two later and was up for the better part of the night.

Since he quit his job, or more accurately since he both quit and I was released from the hospital, he's been sleeping normally for the most part. He falls asleep easily and if he doesn't have anything specific to get up for in the morning, he'll sleep for a solid 8 hours. And to say that thrills me is an understatement.

But now, he also talks in his sleep. I can rarely make out what he's saying, but once in a while he's crystal clear, even if I can't figure out where he's coming from. An hour ago I woke up and he had his hand under my shirt, and I was thinking it wasn't exactly ideal, but if he wanted it that badly, sure, I'd play along. He looked right at me and said, "I like these. We should keep them." His head dropped to the pillow, and he was gone again, lost in whatever freaky dream he was having.

I got up, just in case he changes his mind in whatever world he's in and decides he wants something a little different, and because honestly, I had to write this down in case I forget it.

Yesterday while the kids were in school, Char and I went to the dojang to work out. It was the first time she's attempted anything TKD since her accident, and even though the doctor initially said it would be at least a year before she could get back to it, she's progressed quicker than predicted and since she handled skiing without too many painful moments, she wanted to give a light workout a try. Fifteen to twenty minutes tops, she said.

Muscle memory is a terrific thing; her kicks are lower, she has less power, but technically she's still right on the money. She still has balance, and was able to stand there on one leg while going through a series of kicks with the other. Front-round-side-hook, over and over. She didn't attempt anything that would get her off the ground, nor make contact with anything, but the fifteen minutes she intended turned into an hour. She was in pain when she finally decided she'd had enough, but it wasn't an easy workout; she went at it hard, a lot harder than I'd expected.

Her goal right now is to build up the endurance to make it through a class as a student, and then eventually get back onto the floor teaching a class or two a week.

That's our limit now; one or two classes each a week, preferably on the days when the kids are taking classes. We're enjoying the family time too much to go back to daily classes, and the kids are really liking the down time and just hanging out with friends after school. That might change when spring sports begin, but for now, they're only at the dojang twice a week, and Kevin has his dance classes.

By the way, that kid is getting pretty good at it. Alex went with us yesterday and watched for a while, and he may just be a little bit regretful that he didn't give it more of a try, especially now that Kevin isn't taking ballet. Or that look on his face may have been brotherly pride at seeing Kevin dance that close with a girl and looking very comfortable with it.

Stoner was a birthday gift from Thumper and our friend Sandy; they chipped in and, using my new wife as their helper, bought him for my 34th birthday. He was one of the most thoughtful and loved gifts I've ever received, became a part of our family right off the bat, and when Alex was born he became a protector. I honestly never thought he would live to see fifteen, but he just barely made it. He was 3 months old when Char picked him up, which put his birthday sometime in late January.

I took him to the vet yesterday because he's been going downhill rapidly, and the news was what I was afraid of. A senior of senior dogs, his abdomen was filled with small masses, his heartbeat was erratic, breathing labored, gums nearly white from anemia, but his spirit was good. The vet thought he was likely in some pain, but not overwhelming, so I opted to bring him home so the kids would have a chance to come to terms with what was going to happen this week. I scheduled a re-check for Thursday to see where he was at, but when I told the kids how bad it is, they agreed it was selfish to wait. Alex especially did not want Stoner to suffer at all, and along the way Stoner became his dog, and his buddy. Stoner jogged with me, and looked to me as pack leader, but he was attached to Alex.

Alex spent last night on the living room floor with Stoner, talking to him, making sure his best friend knew he was right there, and told him more than once it was all right to go. Char and I reluctantly went to bed around midnight and let Alex stay there with Stoner; there was no way he was going to bed without the dog, and Stoner just didn't have the energy to move. At 4 this morning, Alex woke me up to tell me Stoner had died. He was sleeping as peacefully as he could, and just stopped breathing.

Part of me thinks I should have stayed up with Alex, but the bigger part of me knows he wanted to be alone, and that Stoner wouldn't have rested at all if I'd been there.

I helped him wrap Stoner in a bed sheet, and we moved him into the den before the other kids were up (Tank stayed with him; that is going to be one lost and cionfused dog for a while.) They knew before I could say anything that Stoner was gone, but neither wanted to see his lifeless body, and I get that. They also both wanted to go to school today anyway, because staying home would just hurt. Alex stayed home, and went with me when I took Stoner's body to the vet. He'll be cremated, and when we get the ashes back, they'll likely go on a shelf in Alex's room until spring. If he's ready then, we'll bury them.

Max once wrote a nice story about Stoner and how we came to have Tank. If you want to read it, it's here.

There's a lot I could say about my wife's last eleven posts. There's a lot I did say about them--to her. What I felt as I read them all back to back
last night, and the memories and emotions that were conjured up were just a bit incredible. As public as we are usually willing to display our affections, I hope you'll forgive me in that what I said to her, and how I thanked her, are very, very private.

But now have at least an idea why I treasure this woman.

11.

Feb 2, 1995

She married me. She didn't realize what a royal idiot I really am and run off screaming. It was not the wedding I wanted to give her, but it was what she says she wanted.

Tonight she was worried I'd be bent out of shape because it seems that morning sickness and a honeymoon don't mix well, but hell, why would I be upset? I have the rest of my life to be with this amazing woman . She needs to sleep through some of the queasiness and I can handle that. It's enough to sit here and watch her sleep and realize that without a doubt, I got it right this time.

Hell, in the history of people getting things right, no one has ever gotten anything more right than I got this.

We did have the wedding I wanted. We got married surrounded by our closest friends, and we knew that their happiness for us was real. I never had that vision of a big wedding in a church, and I don't think I had considered marriage as something I wanted until after the first time Ian kissed me.

Still, I didn't think that our honeymoon was the time to beg off with a headache and massive queasiness, but he honestly didn't seem to mind. I think that started his habit of watching me sleep; it's one of the few times he can sit still and not try to do three things at once, and sometimes I'll start to wake up and I can feel that he's there, watching me breathe. I woke up after a long nap on our honeymoon and he was sitting by the bed, and the way he was looking at me made me feel utterly, completely loved.

And that hasn't changed. I catch him in unguarded moments, and the way he looks at me still makes me feel like my legs are going to turn to water, and when he's not at home I still find myself ticking off the time until he'll be back. His kisses still turn me to jelly inside, and I still melt at his fingers sliding across my skin.

But more than that, he is an amazing father, and I don't think our children can truly appreciate how wonderful he is with them. He loves them fiercely, unconditionally, and he respects them as individuals in a way that sometimes surprises me. He cultivates their interests and is willing to spoil them, just a little, so that they can really explore the world. He listens to them and considers their opinions, even when he can't let them have their own way. If I've pestered him to consider adopting again, it's because he is such a good father, and he has so much love to give.

Fifteen years ago I was certain that we would still be together now. I couldn't have known how many times I would come close to losing him in those first few years and how painful that would be. I didn't stop to think that just because we were over the moon in love that might not be enough; it might not be enough to save him from the ravages of toxic shock and a heart attack, or the agony of losing his mother at a time when we were as emotionally exhausted as we were physically. And I could never have imagined how broken he would be at the chance that he might lose me. Of everything that happened with my accident last year, that's what sticks with me the most. I had fractures and injuries, but he was broken.

I have never doubted, not since those early days when I was caught up in wondering what was wrong with me, that he loves me. He has never had a problem with showing me just how much, even when we've been at our angriest. He can be mad as hell and envisioning my head exploding, but he will always, always stop to tell me he loves me. In a dozen little things he does every day, he shows me.

I've never had that ability, I don't think, to show him so easily how much he means to me, and how empty I would be without him.

All those years ago he wanted to know what I had been waiting for. I couldn't have given him an honest answer then, because I couldn't see the bigger picture. But I think back to that moment when we met, the crushing feeling of being told he was married, and that every man I dated after that just didn't measure up. I think back to every time he sought me out just to hand over routine paperwork, and the smile he didn't seem to have for anyone else. I think back to the sparks I wouldn't have admitted to at the time, and that no one was surprised we wound up together, and I know what I was waiting for.

I was waiting for him.

We both got it right. I am so grateful for the gift of having fifteen years with him and I can only hope for fifteen more, and fifteen beyond that. He amuses me with his nearly paranoid levels of secrecy—I doubt he'll ever be open with people online about where we live and what he used to do, even though most have guessed—and he sometimes surprises and irritates me with his otherwise open frankness, but I can't imagine wanting him to ever be anything other than what he is.

What he is is wonderful, patient, kind, devoted, passionate, heartfelt, and sexy as hell; sometimes I think I fall short of what he deserves, but I am so, so grateful that I'm the one he loves, and I'm the one he wants to be with, and I pray that I never take that for granted.

This still isn't the love letter I wanted to write and I think that he deserves, but my tongue is mentally tied and this is the best I can do. This is the man that I want to annoy me with underwear that falls just this short of the hamper, the man I want to pester every day about the food he eats and the cookies I won't allow in the house, and the man I want to grow very, very old with.

In every way that counts, in the way he would want to hear it, he totally rocks my world.

10.

Jan 12, 1995

I walked into the apartment tonight, and she was sitting there with the lights out, and she was crying. The office was a wreck today and that was my first thought, because I know she went at it with McKee and was close to leaving without having a job today, but no. She had a calendar on her lap and could barely get the words “I'm late” out. Funny, she thought I would be mad. We've talked about kids and she knows how much I want them, but she thought I would be mad.

I didn't think I could love this woman more, but fuck, I do.

She wants this baby. As much as I do. I'M GOING TO BE A FATHER. I don't know what this will do to our wedding plans. I'd like to move them up and get married as soon as we can, but I don't want to ruin anything for her. But goddamn, I'm going to be a father, and the mother of my kid is so fucking amazing I can't even explain it to myself.

You know, he'd said more than once that he wanted kids, and in a sleepy talk about family the morning of January 1st he said he really didn't want to wait more than a year before we started to try to get pregnant, but that was with a June wedding in mind, and I was assuming that he really did mean he didn't want a baby for at least two years. But then I had a horrible day at work, one that ended with me telling my boss to pull his head out of his ass and then shove it back in and inhale deeply, and with me storming out thinking I had probably just managed to get myself fired. The outburst was out of character for me, and as I got into my car I had a transient thought that I must have the worst case of PMS in history. And then it hit me. That case of PMS was a little on the late side.

I went from being mad as hell at my boss to terrified at what Ian would think and what he would say. I sat in the apartment and let myself wind up, and had just about convinced myself that he would be so upset that he would leave and not come back. I'd seen him incredibly angry a few times over the years and it wasn't something I wanted directed at me and I knew I wouldn't be able to handle it; and make no mistake, I thought that if he walked out it would be all my fault. I'd spent months wanting to be with him, but I was too stupid to consider the potential consequences.

There was no question about whether or not I would tell him, or even when, but I was bracing myself for a side of him I didn't like. I just sat there in the living room with the lights off and tried to calm down, and I did this mental rundown of how I would tell him and what I would say, but as soon as I heard his key in the door I started crying all over again, and the only thing I could do was wave the calendar at him and choke out that I was late.

I couldn't even look at him. I didn't want him to turn the light on, but he did and sat on the couch next to me, pulling the calendar out of my hands so that he could get his arms around me. I waited for him to ask me if I was sure, for him to get angry, or even just annoyed, but I felt his breath on my cheek before he pulled me closer, and he whispered “God, I love you,” before he buried his face against my neck.

I was apologizing, but he was overjoyed. I stumbled around the point that it only would have taken me an hour at my doctor's office and we could have avoided this; he countered back that I'd never seen him reaching for a condom, had I? I was naïve and he was Catholic, but somehow I thought that this was my fault.

There was never a moment that I thought we had the option to not have the baby. From the moment I realized that I was very likely pregnant, I wanted him desperately. I chalk my fear up to a very bad day capped with a wash of hormones I couldn't have controlled if I wanted to. Ian's joy was palpable, and when I was finally able to stop crying and look at him, he was grinning.

It took an hour before he asked if I was sure and if I had taken a test; I felt like a complete moron, getting worked up over something I might be very wrong about, especially after seeing how excited he was. And then I felt terrible. No matter which way it was going to go, I realized that I should have gotten the truth before dumping it on him.

He jumped up and said he would be back in half an hour with dinner and a pregnancy test, and I went back to being completely afraid.

I can't even begin to describe his disappointment when he got home, ripped the box open, and discovered that I would have to wait until morning to use it. I think he was awake all night, and by 5:30 couldn't stand it anymore. He woke me up (gently) and was almost upset that I wouldn't let him into the bathroom with me, and I thought he was going to start pinging off the walls while we waited for the result.

Before then, I'd seen him wrestle with emotion, doing the typical guy thing of choking it back and acting like everything rolled right off of him, but when I checked the test and told him it was positive, his eyes filled and he didn't even try to hold it back. It was the first time I saw him cry, and though it wasn't the last, even then I thought it was very telling that he was so overwhelmed with love for a child we hadn't even known about 24 hours earlier that he couldn't hold it back.

9.

December 2, 1994

If I don't ask her soon, I think I'll explode.

I was starting to think the same thing.

Jan 1, 1995

A year ago. Holy shit, it was a year ago that I didn't want to go to the NYE party but forced myself because of protocol, and what if I hadn't?

Ten seconds before midnight I asked her to marry me. I caught her by surprise, but thank God she said yes.

She wants to marry me. How fucking lucky am I?

I've asked myself a hundred times since then, what if he hadn't decided to suck it up and go to that New Year's Eve party? He wasn't in the mood for it, and under the circumstances even McKee, the boss with his head wedged so far his ass he could see out his own nostrils, would have understood. And what if he had been just a little more polite and backed up a step when I said I needed to go inside and find the guy I had gone to the party with?

I wasn't expecting him to propose that night; I could feel he was leading up to it, but I had expected, that like everything else with him, he would take his time getting there. I was all right with that; whether he realized it before that night or not, I had no intention of letting him get away.

We both remembered that I had been far apart from my date the year before and we made sure that as midnight approached we were right there together, and all I was thinking was that he had been right the year before; the person you kiss at midnight as a new year rolls in should be the person you would like to end the year with. When everyone started navigating toward the people they wanted to kiss at midnight, and the countdown was getting ready to start, I looked at him and the expression on his face changed from “Hey, this is way better than last year” to sudden longing. And yet I still didn't get it, and it didn't register with me that he was holding out a ring to me. Right as the countdown from ten began, he told me he loved me more than anything, and all he wanted in life now was me. And he asked me to marry him just in time for me to get “You know it's yes” out before it was midnight.

That was the first and last night I spent at his apartment. I'd been there several times, but he lived in a tiny studio with a mattress tossed onto the floor, and he had a small table lamp on the floor, his computer, and nothing else. He'd asked me a dozen times to help him buy furniture and pick out things like cookware and dinnerware, but I could never bring myself to do it. The truth is that I didn't want to help him furnish an apartment I hoped he wouldn't be living in very long.

We'd had plans for after the office party, a late dinner/early breakfast with Dack and his girlfriend, and Ian made a reservation at a hotel downtown, but I hadn't known that he was going to propose and he hadn't realized that all he would want after hearing “yes” was to be alone with me. His apartment was closest, so that's where we went. It really had nothing to do with sex, but with just being able to hold onto each other and to talk about what we wanted. He thought that I had probably formed an idea in my head when I was a little girl about what kind of wedding I wanted someday; he couldn't have known that I'd never given it any thought because that wasn't what I had grown up with. All the same, he was already talking about what and when. The same man who had moved in slow motion for months was ready to make wedding plans on the spot.

We'd been engaged for all of six hours when we decided to get married in June, just a couple of weeks before my 25th birthday.

8.

October 14, 1994

I don't know if she wants to spend the rest of her life with me, but I'm positive that she's in it for the next few years, at least. She loves me, and I can't ask for more than that at this point. I know for sure where I want to end up with her, I don't think I've ever been more sure about anything, but I'm not ready to propose, mostly because I'm not 100% sure what the answer will be. It was tempting as hell to tell her that I'm not that kind of boy and we should wait for marriage, but one, I was afraid she might take me seriously and really be hurt, and two, she has goddamned long and sharp fingernails and isn't afraid to use them.

I didn't leave this time. I couldn't. I've gotten through every reason I was waiting for, and I didn't think she would have any regrets. And God knows why but she loves me and wanted it to be me. And honestly, I wanted it to be me, too.

I don't know how he could have doubted what my answer would have been, but I wasn't expecting a proposal; I had gotten used to the time he took with everything, and I learned to appreciate it. That's not to say he didn't frustrate the hell out of me because he did. I think he took a borderline perverse delight in kissing me until my knees nearly buckled, and then telling me he had to go back to his own apartment. It hadn't been the soul crunching hurt that it had been before I drunk dialed him right onto my balcony, but I was frequently annoyed with how willing he was to wait. And I wondered most of all exactly what he was waiting for; I loved him, deeply, and he knew that. He loved me, there was no question about it. We had talked about the things we wanted in life and had both hinted that we saw ourselves together a dozen years down the road. He wasn't that guy but by then he should have been sure of how wholly he owned my heart and how deeply I wanted to get into our relationship.

He would have waited for years if I had needed him to. It finally occurred to me that I was so caught up in what I wanted that I didn't think carefully about what he needed. In a lightning bolt thought, I realized he needed me to ask him to not go home, and to say it before he was already halfway out the door. He was doing a very good job at guessing the things I needed, but that was one thing he wasn't going to risk getting wrong. He needed to be sure that if six months from then the relationship exploded in our faces I wouldn't regret being with him, and the only way he was going to be that sure was if I'd made up my mind before he had set one foot into my apartment, before he was tormenting me with a goodnight kiss perfectly intended to make me want more.

Before he had a chance to look at his watch or glance at the door, I asked him to stay; he never said yes or no, but he was still there the next morning, and already complaining that I was way too young for him.

7.

April 19, 1994

Charlie and I had lunch today and I realized something; we're talking about life as if we both expect to be together a couple of years from now. We're making plans. Before I had to get back to work I asked if she thought she would ever want to see Ireland or Brazil or even Arkansas with me and she does, but when she kissed me goodbye she asked, kind of kidding, at least I think she was kidding, if she was going to die a virgin. All I could tell her was to not get hit by a bus on the way home.

I was only kidding. We had relaxed enough with each other (all right, I relaxed); he wasn't holding back because he wasn't sure about being in a relationship with me or because there was something wrong with me, and he made it clear he wanted to know me, not just in a biblical sense yet, that we were talking about everything, from the real, painful reasons I hadn't dated in high school to the guys I had dated half-heartedly after that. He was open to talking about his marriage and divorce and what he thought went wrong, and his insight and ability to forgive was incredible and touching. We were rapidly discovering so much about each other, including the fact that we both wanted kids and wanted a traditional kind of family life, though we skirted around saying we wanted it with each other. I think the only thing that held him back from that was that I wasn't Catholic and he wasn't sure how that could play out because he knew he wanted to raise his kids in his religion, but we were talking about things we wanted to do together, like trips to Ireland. He wanted me to try out Tae Kwon Do and I convinced him to take a dance class with me. Because God, that man could dance, and I wanted to be able to not just keep up with him, but give him half the thrill on the dance floor he gave me.

We were also stepping beyond typical dating and spent a lot of time just hanging out together. It wasn't unusual for him to just show up after work and cook dinner for the both of us, or to come over and do paperwork while I read or watched TV. He didn't feel pressed to entertain me, he cleaned up after himself, and I was quite happy to have him hanging around, even though he pointedly went back to his own apartment every night.

We'd become best friends.

I could tease him about not being willing to sleep with me, though if I had realized how long it was going to take him to understand that I was looking at our future as something incredibly long term, I might have issued an ultimatum.

6.

April 8, 1994

Hey, I'm on a roll today. I refused an assignment to Rwanda today citing conflict of interest because the co-agent assigned is doing my ex-wife, but the ball's honest truth is that I just didn't want to leave Charlie for a month. It will probably mean my exile to the shit list and I'll get the first lame thing to come along, but I don't care.

Tonight I told her I loved her, and damned if she didn't say it back. But I pissed her off later when I still wouldn't have sex with her, much less stay the night. I'm probably an idiot. Hell, not even probably.

He killed his career that day, and I didn't realize it. If I had, I would have told him to take the assignment, because I would still be there when he got back. He knew it would mean more than exile to the assignment dregs; it would mean being taken off the roster that would advance him and put him into the pool of those who just didn't get the sensitive jobs, and would eventually land him behind a desk, but he did it anyway. I naively assumed it meant he would just have to wait for another good assignment. If I had understood, I would have realized then how much he already loved me, and I wouldn't have been aching to hear it.

I also naively thought that when he did say it, and when we both knew how each other felt, that ache would diminish, but it only got worse, and so did he. When we went back to my apartment that evening, I just thought he would stay; he'd told me he loved me and was obvious that he meant it. I told him I loved him, too, and I was sure that it didn't sound like I was saying it just to say it back. We'd had an incredible evening together; he'd been goofy and charming, telling me he was taking me to this 5 star restaurant (that he knew I would not want to go to; our first date had been someplace outrageously expensive and pretentious, and we left after appetizers because I was so uncomfortable there) and then dancing; he drove to Chuck E. Cheese first. He'd orchestrated getting me to dress for fine dining; instead, we played Skee Ball for an hour before heading for Red Lobster. We ended up at a club near my apartment, and danced for at least two hours. When he said he loved me, I nearly melted onto the floor, and I just assumed that when he took me home, he would stay.

I was more hurt than ticked off when he went back to his own apartment, and before he was even to the parking lot I was on the phone crying to my best friend. How could he possibly say he loves me, but not want to be with me? She laughed, amused with how dense I really was, and told me I was asking the wrong person.

And she was right. If I wanted to be with him, I had to be able to talk to him about it, so I did the only thing I could think of. I drank half a bottle of wine and drunk dialed him at two in the morning. I don't think I even let him get two words in, he just listened to my crying, whiny, tipsy questions, and when I finally stopped to catch my breath, he just sighed I'll be there in five minutes.

He wound up spending the night, but not like I'd hoped. He pulled me out onto the balcony, as far from my bedroom door as he could get, and held me until I wasn't such a sobbing mess, and then he started to explain. He wasn't that guy and never would be; all those women I forced him to go out with, they all knew what he was up to and he did nothing more than kiss a few of them on the cheek, and that was out of gratitude that they were willing to help him get even a slim shot with me. He couldn't even remember the last time he'd had sex and wanted to be with me more than I could even realize, but...he wasn't that guy. He thought that if I had waited that long (I was 23, pushing 24) then I waited for a reason and he wasn't going to take that away from me if it wasn't one hundred per cent right.

When I tried to counter with “I thought you said you loved me,” he was as gentle as I could have hoped for when he said that was exactly why he would wait. He loved me, and when he was completely sure that I was truly ready and not just slightly horny and very curious, he'd hold nothing back.

He may not have known, but by the time morning rolled around and he was still there with me, on the sofa with his arms wrapped around me, I knew I wanted to marry him.

5.

March 26, 1994

It's two in the morning and I am alone. I didn't have to be; and when I left this shithole tonight I was about 90% sure I wouldn't be, but the closer we got the more I had the feeling that Charlie's never been with anyone before. I know what she wants and she's not alone in that, but damn. I can't do that to her yet. I know where I want this to go, but until I'm sure that's where she wants us to end up—fuck. I hope to hell I didn't hurt her feelings when I said I had to leave before I did something she'd regret later. She looked like she was hurt and I did a piss ass job of explaining why I was leaving, but it was either leave when I did or do something she might wish she hadn't six months from now.

He did a horrible job of explaining why he wouldn't stay. It also wasn't even an explanation so much as it was a sputtering about what I would regret and how he didn't think it was appropriate for him to just assume anything. I remember that night not just because he walked out when I really didn't want him to, but because I had honestly thought that the words I love you were right on the tip of his tongue and he was leaving to avoid spitting them out.

I was more confused than hurt, but to be fair I didn't have the nerve to say anything that would make him stay, and I had no idea that he'd guessed I had very limited—nonexistent, really—experience with men. He was shaking up nearly every assumption I had about men in general; he was gentle and considerate, he wasn't pushing for more than I wanted—just the opposite—but instead of appreciating it I was taking it personally. He was a man for god's sake, so why wasn't he trying to get me into bed?

4.

March 18, 1994

Son of a bitch, I'm in love with this woman. I haven't said it, but she has to know.

I think by this point, I was just waiting to hear it, but was also vacillating with does-he-or-doesn't he. I didn't have the nerve to say it first, and I agonized over the idea that we'd only been actually dating for a little over a month, because it seemed far too soon to feel that much. Sometimes I felt like I was fifteen again, all that internal he likes me! squealing, combined with all that adolescent uncertainty of knowing how much.

The way he danced with me made me think he liked me more than just a little, and the way he kissed me made me pray he was falling hard, but then the way he backed off just left me confused. But I knew I loved him, but he was so frustrating I just wasn't 100% sure what he was thinking.

Ian had boundaries; I didn't realize it at the time and he wasn't pointing them out, but they were big enough I tripped over them so many times. I know I had my own; I held men at arms' length for the most part and worked hard at not getting in too deep with anyone. When I was a teenager it wasn't by choice; the boys in my neighborhood and the ones who actually bothered to show up at school were terrified of my father (and with good reason.) I knew they were headed nowhere and wasn't exactly disappointed that no one was beating down my door to ask me out, but it left me hesitant and unsure when I was on my own and starting to realize that not all men were like that, and there were a few that could hold their own with my dad.

When I met Ian I had probably been out with a grand total of four different guys, and it was never anything that would go beyond being just friends. After I met him, and especially after I had spoken with him a few dozen times, something clicked in my head. I still dated, but where I held them at arms' length before, I was practically shoving them away.

I kept telling myself it was just that I wasn't going to settle, and whoever got past that kiss goodnight was going to have to be incredibly special. I didn't realize I was comparing them all to someone I couldn't have. It's not even that I didn't have feelings for anyone else; I did. I was deeply in like a couple of different times, but it never got past that, and for whatever I had brewing inside me, it didn't matter.

Ian was different from the start; aside from the effort he went through just to get me to go out with him, he was just a bit different from the guys I'd dated that I'd actually cared for. I never felt like the was working overtime to impress me; he was who he was and I either had to like that or not, but he was also considerate and thoughtful. He wasn't thrilled to find out I had a cat, but the second time he came to my apartment he brought her treats and catnip toys, and noting how much she loved to jump and climb, he built her a series of staggered shelves on one wall that she could climb up and down to her heart's content.

He listened intently, even to the things I didn't say; when I mentioned off handedly that I'd never been on skates of any kind because owning a pair in the neighborhood was an invitation to get mugged for them, he showed up at my door with inline skates dangling from his fingers—he'd known what size I needed because he peeked inside my shoes when I wasn't looking. When I was terrified on them, he held me steady, skating slowly alongside until I was fairly sure I wouldn't fall—and then he refused to let go, telling me it wouldn't be half as fun if he couldn't hold my hand.

He figured out a way to sit still for me; he doesn't enjoy movies because he has such a hard time sitting there for two hours, but he managed it for me. I never had to ask, and it was a long time before I knew just how hard that was for him.

None of what he did was designed to make me think he was anything more than he was; I'd been watching him too long to fall for that. He was by nature thoughtful and considerate, and warmly affectionate. He even pulled me out of the office one afternoon when it was pouring rain, as cold as it was, just so I could say I'd been kissed in the rain.

A month after we out together the first time, I was falling and had no intention of keeping Ian at arms' length. If anything, I wanted to pull him a little closer, but I tripped over those damned boundaries of his.

3.

Jan 19, 1994

Kathy is moving full speed ahead and we'll be done with each other sooner rather than later. We had lunch together to go over some of the specifics, like selling the house and assorted crap and will I pay off her car? I didn't know she had financed it, but that says a lot about our relationship over the last couple of years, I guess. There was a lot I didn't know. Seeing her wasn't as uncomfortable as I thought it would be. I'm not angry now, and now I know she made the right decision even if her timing was abysmal.

I told her there's someone I'm interested in, I don't know why I did because I wasn't out to hurt her; maybe because I know she wants me to be happy? She was fine with it and already knew I was trying to date because Dack told her; she guessed who without being told. How the hell did she know? She says it's never been a secret from anyone, that they all knew that sooner or later I would drift towards Charlie, but she thought it would take me a little longer. What the hell?

I didn't really know, either, but I sure as hell had not been quiet with my friends about what I thought about Ian. I think I'd mentioned one time too many how cute I thought he was, and how funny and friendly he was, and how lucky his wife had to be. I'd realized he always turned his paperwork in to me when he came back from an assignment and he flirted, but I tried not to make anything of it and I never realized everyone else had noticed.

If I had known then that his soon-to-be-ex had set him up with several women for the sole purpose of chewing through my 25-dates demand—I honestly don't know how I would have reacted, but it's one of the reasons I was willing to give her a chance later, when we visited his parents and she was right there down the street, offering us the use of her house. She loved him; she let him go but she still loved him, which I've always thought was somewhat of a testament to the kind of man he is and the respect she has for him.

In any case, I knew most of the women I worked with were well aware of what I thought about him, but no one ever told me they thought it was working both ways. It's probably a good thing they didn't, or I would have been terrified.

He created his own version of speed dating, and it took him less than a month to do it. All that gossip and tittering behind my back, I didn't realize what they were laughing about was that he was completely upfront about what he was doing. It turned into an office mission: everyone date Murf, just go to McDonald's for lunch with him or a quick walk in the park, because that constitutes a date. He had the married women in the office upset because, even though he was only going through the motions and they knew it, he refused to “date” a married woman.

There was even debate about whether I specifically told him to date 25 women, or 25 people, because there were a couple of guys who volunteered to help him chalk off a couple of slots on his list and were a little put off when it was decided that I'd probably been specific about gender.

Less than a month after he asked me out, Ian walked into the office and marched up to my desk to tell me he had held up his end of the deal; did I intend to hold up mine? He started out trying to act brash and tough, but in seconds melted a little and looked like a little boy asking please? I didn't quite believe him, though, because there was no way anyone could have dated up that kind of frenzy so quickly.

Dack swore he had, and all the little rats popped out of the woodwork to tell me they had gone out with him. When I realized what he had done, and how he and Dack had drafted so many people we worked with behind my back, just to get me to say yes...I think then I knew I would fall for him, and it would be so much more than the crush I'd been grappling with.

Hey, Chucks

Yeah, it's a lot like this.

Happy anniversary, angel, and thank you for the most amazing fifteen years

2.

Jan 7, 1994

I can't get that woman off my mind and I can't be in that office and look at her without thinking that I could have gone home with her on New Year's Eve. She's been watching me, too, and I'm not the only one noticing that. Dack gives me shit about it, McKee has warned me to keep my distance because it wouldn't be “professional,” and Cork has pointed out that I'm not exactly avoiding her. I don't give a damn what McKee thinks; it isn't like I was stalking one of the other agents; Charlie is strictly office, and I don't see the harm in it.

So, I asked her out. And she shot me down. I think I flinched when she said no, because I expected her to be willing to go out with me at least once, but she followed it up. She doesn't want to be my rebound. She knows I'm in the middle of getting a divorce, and she doesn't want to be the woman I soothe hurt feelings with. It wasn't a complete denial, though, if I can get 25 other women to go out with me first and I still want to see her, she'll say yes. It's kind of fucked up and I don't think I know 25 women, much less women who will go out with me, but I'll give it a shot. My gut says she's worth the effort.

I agonized through that week; everyone in the office could see us flirting and every time he walked past I couldn't stop myself from watching him. I know I had a running chant going through my head, ask me out, ask me out, ask me out, but when he did and the word “no” came out of my mouth, I was horrified. That's all I had wanted since that New Year's Eve kiss, but as soon as he asked it hit me hard that he was just getting out of a marriage, and I didn't want to be the person he got over the hurt with. If I was going to have even a small chance of getting what I wanted, I just couldn't be the first person he dated.

Everyone thought I was insane. My best friend kept telling me how stupid I was, and Dack kept pointing out that I was setting Ian up to fall for someone else, because somewhere in 25 different women was someone he would likely click with. I worried about that endlessly; for years I'd set him up as the ideal man, and when I had my chance, I sent him off to play with other women. And it killed me, especially when I stopped to consider that I had tossed out such a high number of women I wanted him to date, and I didn't know if he was going sleep his way through that long list of women or if he would settle for dinner and a movie. I had only kissed him once and hadn't gone out with him at all, and was honestly a little angry at the idea he was out there having random sex with someone that wasn't me.

My fear only got worse with the increasing behind-my-back gossip buzzing around the office. I could hear the mute laughing and knew half of it was aimed at me. I heard bits and pieces of information that went through me like a knife: Murf was in a dating frenzy and half the secretarial pool had gone out with him. He was funny, he was sweet, and god was he ever sexy.

I just knew he was going to fall for someone else, and I had no one to blame for it but myself. I had one chance at starting a relationship with him, and I blew it. I handed him over to the masses, and I doubted I'd have another chance.

I broke my own heart.

1.

You may have noticed that Ian is not afraid to lay his feelings on the table for everyone to see and to pick at; he's been like that as long as I've known him, and it occurred to me recently that I've known him for nearly twenty years now. I started working in the same office he was in when I was 18, but didn't actually meet him for another year. I know he doesn't remember exactly when we met (and that's all right) but I do. I remember it largely because I was instantly attracted and then crushed when I found out he was married. Dack introduced us while they were signing back in from an assignment, and I thought there were sparks there, but once my initial interest was snuffed I made it a point to try to not think about him as much more than that really nice guy who treated the office staff like they were equals and not servants.

I've been thinking about how we got together a lot lately. And it occurred to me that in all these years, while he's been very open and makes no apologies for “oozing mush” I haven't been as vocal. I've never written my husband a love letter, even though he deserves that a thousand times over. I also had no idea how to start, or what to say to him other than how much I love him.

He has always kept a journal; we have a closet that has boxes filled with the volumes he's written in over the years. I think he started keeping one when he was Alex's age, and other than a few gaps when he was on assignment and had no way to write, he's kept it going since then. With our anniversary approaching, his journals are what kept popping into my head.

They have never been off limits to me, but I didn't read any of them until 1997, when he had his heart attack. His doctor assured me it was a “small” heart attack and he would be fine, but he was in CCU and that by itself didn't sound promising. I was exhausted; I had a toddler and a newborn whose birth I had barely recovered from, we'd had the biggest blowout our relationship had endured (or even has still, and it was my fault) and his mother had just died.

Late at night, after I had gotten the kids to sleep and I was sitting in bed feeling his absence overwhelmingly, I reached for his journal, because I knew as I read his words I would be able to hear his voice in my head, and I read until Rachel woke up to be changed and fed, and then I kept reading. I saw our relationship through his eyes, how much he loved me before he was even able to say it; being able to see how he felt before he could even tell me made me feel both better and worse, and I was terrified he would die before I could make him understand that he wasn't alone in how deeply he cared.

He has loved me without reservation, and with a passion that even our kids can see (and make fun of) and I've wanted to find a way to let him see that he's not alone in that.

I realized recently that I still haven't done that, not the way I had intended. So I asked him if I could use some of things he'd written about; he was instantly suspicious about it and I don't think he was comfortable with it, but he said yes. I can't write him the love letter I want to, but I can take his words and tell him what I was thinking and feeling at the time.

I've edited out the extremely personal, the things I know he wants kept private, and the things I don't want to share with anyone but him. And while I intended this to be just a longish blog post, it quickly became so long that it was impossible to do that with, so on the advice from a friend, the 12 pages I ended up with will wind up being several different posts. The block quotes are from his journal, and I can't even begin to tell you what it means to me that he trusted me with his most private thoughts, and allowed me to share some of them.

Jan 1, 1994

I co-opted someone else's date last night, but I don't feel as bad about it as I probably should. Just showing up to the damned party was a victory unto itself and by 9:45 I was ready to leave, but didn't think that would go over very well with McKee. So I grabbed a bottle from the bar and headed out for the veranda, and Charlie Simms was out there. She said she was just getting some fresh air, but I saw the dipwad she was there with and was 80% sure she needed as much of a break from his headuphisassness as I needed a break from the noise of the party and the fun everyone else was having.

Let's face it, that office is filled with pretentious assholes and I'm one of them, but she's one of the bright spots in my day. When I get back from the field and hand in my reports, I look for her instead of that ditzy chick with the braces or it's-MIZZZ-Donner-not-MISS. If anyone was going to be out there punching holes in my being alone I was glad it was her. At first I just wanted to be polite, say hello and talk for a minute until she went back in, but once we started talking the time flew by and the next thing I know it's almost midnight and I'll do or say anything to keep her from going back inside to find the dipwad. And fuck if it's infidelity, but my marriage is over and I'm not getting it back and I don't even want it back, but I kissed her and she damn well kissed me back. I mean, she really kissed me. What I don't know is if it means anything to her or if I should even let my head go there. I really don't know. That kiss felt like it was something a long time coming, but I don't know how it could have been, and for all I know she's forgotten about it and is doing the dipwad.

Five minutes after he wandered outside and struck up a conversation, I wanted him to kiss me. He had no way of knowing that I'd had a crush on him for nearly four years, and that the entire time we sat out there in the bitter cold, I was trying to figure out just how to make that happen. I wasn't brave enough or forward enough to just do it on my own, but I wanted him to kiss me in the worst way. After two hours we were sitting very close to each other—he was trying to steal warmth, think, and I was just tying to get closer—but he hadn't even hinted he might be thinking of the same thing; I decided he was still too hurt from separating from his wife, and since it was near midnight it would be a good idea if I headed back inside to see if my date was even still there; that's when he set his hand on my arm and started talking a mile a minute, and suggested that the guy I was with was not the guy I wanted to be with at the start of the new year. Because the person you kiss should be someone you want to be with on the next New Year's Eve; after hearing that and then realizing he actually was going to kiss me, I was thrilled and scared at the same time. He didn't know if it meant anything to me, but I had no idea if he was serious or just a little bit drunk, and I knew if he was just a little bit drunk I would be more crushed than I was when I found out he was married.

It was only one kiss, but it was the longest and deepest kiss I'd ever had, and my feelings were just a little bit hurt when he pulled away and said we should really get back inside. Inside was the date I was ready to abandon, and other people to distract him, and honestly, even a cold as it was I wanted to stay out there and see if he really was that good a kisser or if it was just first-kiss fuzzies.

He lingered at the bar with me for a few more minutes, until “the dipwad” found me again; he was polite as hell as he said goodnight and then left, something he got very good at over the next ten months.