44

I have stood up at birthday gatherings to read this aloud as a toast, and I have written it on cards mailed to express the same. Many mornings I have lazed in bed, wishing to lock these words to memory in the way I have the lyrics of Leonard Cohen and the prose of Pat Conroy. 

What though youth gave love and roses, 

age still leaves us friends and wine. 

It feels, at this point in my life, as if I have lived both these lines though never at the same time. Until today. Until her.

With her, because of her, words seen by me before as defining and with boundaries, now seem fluid. They intertwine and overlap as easily as waking legs tangle up in linen sheets. Age doesn't define, gender doesn't define, race doesn't define...

Not as the individual that I am, but as a committed couple I've been slow to embrace her norm. I am the trick candle which goes out then relights, goes out then relights, goes out then relights. 

I know my strength ultimately steadies me, and I know her sweet patience has no end. It was a premonition that brought us together, sealed then by a secret. Now love and passion and joy keep us devoted.

My wish that we remain forever so, a wish no longer unnerving, is the unwrapped gift I give to her this day.

Happy Birthday, Baby.   



Thomas Moore, National Airs, Spring and Autumn, st. 1 (1815)

dazed, not confused

"Let's just eat out of the pan," she says, as I'm reaching for two pasta bowls.

It's our pattern now; each hot pan of pasta is set between us on an iron trivet at the table. We talk. We twirl. 

Sometimes we have appetizer plates for cutting things such as large shrimp, or we may have a side bowl to pile up empty clam shells.

We sit close. Her hands are rarely not touching me. 

We share food while sharing truths.

"What was something Sarge did that irked you?" she asked halfway through our last dinner of linguine. That's what she has called Spoke from the beginning, being her respect for the man she never met but wishes to know much about. As a veteran, she has a bond with him, but by her many questions, she knows more about him than most people.

I swallowed hard. I thought hard. I drew a blank.

I tried to recall by categorizing: chores, leisure, money, sex, vacations, work...

Several bites later I put down my fork and wiped away tears.

Wow. Wow! There was nothing he did that irked me.

We've talked about it; of how easily new love can reach that stage. We talk a lot. We talk about everything.

But that night we cleared the table in silence, both of us amazed. 

She poured us more wine. We sat back down. To talk.