Part of what makes me who I am, is that I am a story teller. I thoroughly enjoy hearing and telling stories of events that happen in life. I also know full well when I am being “watched from afar”, so I am mindful about how much I share and when. I may not say much at times, but I’m no one’s fool. People give lip service to loving and caring when, even if they aren’t aware of it, they just don’t. I have always noticed this, but I just hoped for the best and kept quiet. Now, I am more mindful than ever of how I conduct myself as I face what simply is, in life with various people.

I never realized how cynical I can be until now. I thought I was overly trusting but I am finding that’s just not true. One area that I am waking up to true love in, is with my husband. Although we have our fair share of issues and disagreements, I believe I have held him at arms length to a degree, expecting him to change up on me at any given moment and display the toxic behaviors I grew up with and am still very much accustomed to.

The fact that he has not ever done those things, has done nothing to dissuade me from that expectation, even after 24 years together. I expect him to be selfish, heartless and mean and when he doesn’t, I’m confused.

When he does behave selfishly, I think, “See? I knew it!” Recently, I messed up royally and fell asleep when I was supposed to be letting him in the house. He stood outside calling me and our daughters, getting no reply until he tried our oldest, who let him in. I’d literally just gotten off the phone with him, fell asleep and had my phone on silent. Needless to say, he wasn’t pleased to be stuck outside after midnight when we just got off the phone.

When he came in, he woke me up and told me what happened. I apologized as he went to brush his teeth. I stayed up, worried, and on alert. I was waiting for the cold shoulder. I expected him to ignore me for a while whether that be hours, days, weeks, or more. It didn’t matter that he’s never done this before in our lives together. I waited. When he came back into our room, he looked at me, gave me the prettiest and most genuine smile, and said, “Happy Anniversary.” I was stunned and said, “You aren’t mad at me?” He said, “Not anymore. That’s over.” I was shocked.

I mentioned in my last blog post that part of an anniversary gift was his bringing home my dear cousin Tami and her 4 daughters for 3 days. He said he wanted to make me happy. As they were leaving, Tami told me there was more to come. I felt so happy with her and the girls’ visit, I couldn’t really imagine what more he could do to top or come close to that. I am very sentimental. Details count with me. He drove over 200 miles to get them and take them back home. That’s a lot, especially when he is not a fan of road trips. Anyway, he declared this anniversary was his year to plan for us and really went all out in celebration of our 20th year of marriage.

He told me to block out specific dates and pretty much demanded that I not mess up this one rule. One year, he surprised me and took me to Hawaii which I almost messed up. Ten years ago, I completely botched a trip to Paris for our 10th anniversary. I’ve grown in wisdom since then, lol.

This time, he told me not to even pack clothes, as he wanted to buy them at our destination. I complied this year, thankfully. He had a harder time keeping where we were headed a secret this time, and I just smiled when I saw Las Vegas on the screen, printing our boarding passes at the airport’s kiosk. I didn’t really care where we went, as long as we were together. He’d been away a lot and I miss him. We spent our first day in Vegas, taking walks and seeing some of the sights. The next day, we rented a car, drove to San Diego, and spent a day and night there. On the way back to Vegas, he messed up. While shopping at an outlet, he asked about one daughter’s shoe size. I told him and then said I’d call her to check to be sure. I couldn’t reach any of my 3 girls. I began to freak out. Long story short, I called, left voice messages, text messages, emailed each, sent messages through What’s app, Marco Polo, Google Duo, Facebook Messenger, and Instagram. I was soon convinced that my 5 children had been trafficked and began freaking out- all the way.

Eventually, my oldest sent me a text message, asking about some soap I made. Still not convinced they were OK, I demanded they call me. Another daughter text me saying sorry and giving some lame excuse for not being reachable. After an hour, one finally called. As we spoke, there was suddenly a weird echo. A moment later, I heard the door to our suite open and saw all 5 of my children and my niece Jeteya walk in! It was all so surreal. They laughed, saying they’d planned everything out except how to account for going missing for about 6-7 hours. Again, Jermaine said that he wanted to do what he knew would make me happy.

We rented a van the next day and visited the beach, Hollywood’s Walk of Fame and more, in LA. We had an amazing time.

My prayer is that I would continue to be open to true love and accept what I have in and with my husband. This man very obviously adores me as I do, him. I don’t want to miss out on a thing. I want to soak it all up and enjoy our life together. I feel so grateful and fulfilled.