29 Years

With a title like that this ought to be a birthday post.

My parents recently celebrated anniversary 29. Twenty-nine years is literally more than a lifetime for me. I think of everything I've done with my lifetime, slap on a few more years to make up for the difference in time, and that's what my parents have given to each other. All of that life, lived for someone else.

Sometimes I wonder how they did it. My parents seemed to have learned not so much how to work with each other over the last 29 years as much as how to work around each other. An important skill, they both acknowledge. The dinner conversation is always fun as Ma and Pa think they've communicated perfectly when really I'm the only one that understands what they've said and also that they have no idea what each other has said. When it matters I point it out (Pa thinks Ma has told him to do something when Ma thinks she's told Pa not to do something); when it doesn't, I don't.

But it's always been clear to me how much they love each other. Not a day has gone by that I have seen both of them together (which doesn't always happen, even when I live with them in their house) that they don't kiss and tease and smile. Even if just a moment before they were exasperated and shaking their heads at each other. They would also do anything in the world for each other. Though it ought to be noted that they don't often ask each other to do things that they can do for themselves because they know the way the other person would do it would drive them crazy. Still, it's the feeling that counts here.

What it all comes down to is that I'm glad my parents have stuck it out and made it work for 29 years, crazy in love the whole time. Not because they are driven crazy by their love, but because they drive each other crazy, but still love every bit of each other, even the craziest of the crazy bits.

Happy 29 years, Ma and Pa. Someday, when I make my 29 years lived for someone else, it will be because you showed me how.