Day 77 - He Loves Me; He Loves Me Lots

Dave is busy. Really really busy. And sometimes when I tell people that, they get all "oh poor you." And sometimes, I admit, I feel that way too.

But mostly, I support him with my entire heart and soul. Why? Because I love that Dave has dreams and vision and ideas for his life. Because I view my role in his life (or my role in anybody's life for that matter) as a support beam--I want for Dave what he wants for himself. As long as he stays within the line of legal, moral, and with respect for me and my dreams, I want to be the tailor that stitches his wings together, the breath of wind that whispers 'you can do it, I'm here for you.'

And it's vice versa too. I believe that what I want for my life is what he wants for me too. Dave's not gaga over art like me. And I'm not really turned on by the business world like him. But the common thread that binds us is our mutual respect for our respective loves--we're each other's fans, we cheer each other on.

I care that Dave HAS passion about something, not if I share it. In our vows we promised, "I will trust you with my dreams, and support you in fulfilling yours."

And I'm not saying it's all perfection. It's not. I've been known to throw little pouting fits when I find out he won't be accompanying me to the next family fiesta. Or I've abruptly ended phone conversations when he calls to tell me he'll be late to our dinner date. I've said I'm o.k., no, it's nothing...more than once when I didn't mean it. I've even stared at him as if he single-handedly took away my soul when he changed our Thanksgiving plans.

But the fact of the matter is: Nothing is perfect. But what I DO consider perfect is that no matter what: I trust him. He never pushes me past my limits. He respects me and my words when I say, 'This is my limit of what I can give you, without forgoing my needs.' Which really sounds more like this: 'I need your time so badly it hurts.'

When I get there, he always rushes towards me. He never walls himself away, defensive. He never says, "Why don't you calm down?" or "You're being ridiculous." He says, "O.k. what can I do?" He opens. If he closed in those moments, I'm positive we would have never made it to that beautiful spring day, pledging our everlasting devotion. His gentle and kind reactions to me make my heart blow up like a balloon. My love is as infinite as air.

The other day, he arrived home late at night after a long day of work. This week has been extra rough. In his eyes were smiles and in his hands were a vase of two red roses and one white. I beamed knowingly at him as he handed me the plump and fragrant knot of petals. He beamed too.

You see, recently I added the phrase "Give wife presents--pretty flowers" to his lengthy to-do list on the dry erase board hanging up in his personal office. Giggling to myself as I scribbled.

Instead of laughing off my humorous addition to his to-do list, he drove around the neighborhood after work looking for an open retail store. He finally spotted a 24-hour drive-thru flower kiosk (gawd love California) where clean glass cubes displayed vases of various flowers.

He didn't mention my addition to his to-do list. Instead he said, "The flowers there were seriously beautiful, not a bad one in the bunch."

The next day I noticed a very important item on his list with a new checkmark next to it.