Orleans

This is a long-overdue piece about Carrie, my lovely and pliable wife.

There would be no Senyor Madre without a Senyora Madre, especially this particular one. We have so many children because I just had to lay with her more than twice. Had to.

She's The Catch in this relationship, so many things that I'm not: beautiful, volatile, smart smart smart, forgiving, energetic, sociable. Ok, I am some of those things.

Let me try again: computer whiz, industrious, female, emotional, human, great mom, employed, nurturing, and cooking from scratch. Also, she's fun and has many friends because she likes people. Mostly though, she's who I envisioned marrying when I was single--ponytailed, serious, girly, argumentative, and above all....fertile as the old woman who lived in the shoe!!

I kid because I love, but only about the last part. We have so many kids, too, but we do know what to do, mainly because she's ambitious about planning and wants the best for them. When she was home and I was working, their days were full with her women's group (Newcomers shout-out!) playgroups and walks and trips to the gym and I'm sure some dancing and singing and water-hose play.

I do that stuff, too, but not as much. What I do, though, is because of her example.

We're approaching our fifth anniversary, and thankfully, the official gift of fifth anniversaries is wood. I can give her that, easy.

Ahem, moving on, she's a great spackler and does not wait for me to take care of home projects. She loves to garden and make messes with water. She probably could install ceiling fans and light fixtures, but she lets me, because she knows it's the sort of thing I wanted to do when I became a husband.

She laughs and I like it a lot, particularly if it's me who made her laugh. I will tell Connor and Gavin that if they can make women laugh, they'll do alright (unless they turn out to prefer men; then I guess they should make men laugh). They could snag a babe like their Mom (unless they turn out to prefer men; then they could snag a....I can't finish that).

I like that people like her, because I know it makes her feel good. I've seen her go all Momma Bear on folks, too. We have one well-defended litter, to take an analogy too far.

I try to remember to tell her nice things, and say thank you, and clean the house more, and not call her Momma even when the kids are in the room, but I don't as much as I should. Carrie does so much to make our lives better and happier, and I take her for granted.

Doesn't mean I'll stop, but now it's out in the open, so we can deal with it. Communication like that will get us another five years, and after that, we'll just grab onto the romance rocket and blast through another 40 years.

I'll be 88 then, and she'll be younger than me still. And we will be that old couple holding hands and shuffling down the middle of the bike trail, wondering where our house is.

I love you, Carrie