Happy Anniversary, you Habbis-Dabble!

Well, who would have thunk it? We have made it thru' another year. Was it just 5 years ago, last night, that you looked at me.... in the moonlight....and pruny from being in the pool too long. I had just ripped your swimming trunks off .... ONE MORE TIME!!! And you said, "Wanna get married on Saturday?" Now mind you, Saturday was less than 48 hours away. I laughed and brushed him off. We had been engaged for awhile and not in any huge rush to the alter in our 40's/50's. He explained that there was a judge who was marrying people for free at the UC Law Library that Saturday. All we had to do was show up with a license and she would do the deed. We laughed over it and continued to float under the stars.

The following day, I get to work and about 10am my co-worker/manager says "So, you going to get married tomorrow?" I about fell out of my chair! It is just the 2 of us in a small office. I KNOW she hasn't had time to talk to Tom, but where did she get this? And she says she heard the story on the news coming to work on the radio and thought of us. What a cool idea. And I told her about the previous night at the pool. And I got to thinking..... She handed me the phone and said..."Call Tom." So I did. I said, "So, wanna get married tomorrow?" It was dead silent on the phone. HE has been worried that I would be missing out on the "big" wedding, even though I kept saying I didn't want to blow the cash. So he started making the calls to see if this was even "do-able", and VERY long story-short, it was. He went to downtown to get a copy of his D-I-V-O-R-C-E and then as a wedding gift my co-worker let me leave early ..with pay... so we could get to the other end of our county to get our license before they closed. We had a camera and had the sheriff at the metal detector take our picture with our license, since he was the only one still around when we got there. Then we rushed home to get ourselves ready for a wedding. I made a bouquet with 2 dozen white roses from Costco and lots of white ribbon from Michaels and had a bout. made for Tom at the local Krogers. I bought a sugar-free cake, berries, and champagne at Krogers for after the ceremony. And I made a "bucket-o-bait".

You see, I was serious about that bit about not being in any rush. I always told Tom that some Saturday morning I would get a wild burr and wake up and say "grab a hat". He would say " can't I get a shower?" And I would reply, "Nope...we're getting married." And I would drag him down to the river to the local Justice-of-the-Peace/Bait Salesman who would drag out the "little woman", Erleen, in her pink foam rollers and mu-mu, singing "Can I get a Witnessss...". He would say "You do? You Do? Y'all Done!" Then he would have each of us spit in our palms, spin around twice and shake hands and we would be married. And as a parting wedding gift we would get a bucket-o-bait.

And I made a bucket-o-bait for Tom as a wedding gift. I took sugar-free chocolate cookies and made "dirt" and sugar-free gummy worms and put them in a white take-out bucket. VOILA!

Soooooo on an EXTREMELY hot, very humid day in June... the 16th, to be precise.... I became Mrs. Tom. The wedding was short. We were the first ones there. Which in itself was the miracle of the day, because our Tom will be late to his funeral. But one of the best things about the wedding was the people afterwards. You see, Tom and I were there alone. We took no one with us. But it was like everyone who was in the building was family. Everyone congratulated us. Strangers hugged us and shooked our hands. We heard stories about other people's weddings many years past. And then, there was the behemoth of a man standing outside with a cigarette in each hand, smoking like it was his last hour, who was simply thrilled that Tom looked happy because then it just COULDN'T be TOO horrible, could it?

So, my habbis-dabble, my bee-bee, my darling man. My savior, the love of my life, the keeper of my heart. Here's to another year. Since each is better that the last, I cannot imagine what our 50th is going to be like!

Mores & Mores!
T