Sickiversary

Kendon and I have been married for a year.  A YEAR.  So to celebrate 365 days of still liking each other, we got all dressed up and reserved our own private table at Beni Hana’s, where Ramon from Mexico gave us the most spectacular display of dancing shrimp and juggling knives and onion volcanoes that a person on their first anniversary could ever possibly hope for.  We held hands under the table and tasted garlicky meat off each other’s plate and reminisced and gave each other presents.  Besides the fact that neither of us announced it on Facebook, I’m pretty sure it’s exactly what a first anniversary is supposed to look like. 

These festivities came and went over a week ago.  Oddly enough, though, today is the day I feel like I truly understand what it means to be married for a year. 

That’s because today I’m the opposite of all dressed up.  In fact, I bear a striking resemblance today to the creature from the black lagoon… minus the fangs and with a bathrobe instead of green teutonic armor.    Currently I am stopping after each sentence to make my now-customary fog horn sound into a dwindling roll of toilet paper, creating a pile of snot rags that is creeping steadily up to the ceiling.   I haven’t combed my hair in two days, my lips are cracking off my face, and I rotate at night between being feverishly hot and ripping off the blankets, to shivering so hard that our room shakes and pictures fall off the wall.

Oh yeah. And the husband still finds me sexy.

Over the last few days, he’s remained by my side through three Disney movies and several chapters of Ender’s Game (our post-Harry read-a-thon).  He’s made me soup and bought me medicines.  He tucks me in and massages my sore muscles and forces me to gargle salt water.  I’ve started to call him Nurse Bagley, but then again, a mere nurse would not go so disgustingly far as to steal slimy kisses in between foghorn blasts. 

So that’s how I know what first-anniversary love feels like.  It’s a feeling that the tallest onion volcano could never hope to replace.  It’s the kind of love that really does endure in sickness and in health. 

So while I avoided Facebook on the anniversary, today I would like to publicly express to the Internet that I have been married for a YEAR to the kindest, bravest, most disgusting man on this good planet.  (I had to throw in the last one.  Seriously.  Only a grossy would want to kiss THIS on the mouth.)

Oh, and in case you're interested, here's some photographic documentation of our actual anniversary:

We are in love.

Can you find the onion volcano among the shrimp and raw beef?

Ramon was a good chef.  We're thinking of adopting him.

Guess who I made this for as a happy anniversary gift? (Hint: It was not Ramon.)