Eleven

It is funny how much of our lives are predicated on a factor of five. We always break down the passage of time, especially anniversaries on those terms. Five years. Ten Years, etc. The same was true for Heather and I. We marked our tenth anniversary last year with a big trip sans the kids. So this year being eleven really did not strike either of us as a huge deal. Partly because we are conditioned to celebrate these things every five or ten years. The other part for us is life being the rushing river we happen to be riding carries us on a breakneck current where we only have a fleeting moment for one of us to yell "Hey! Look! We've been married eleven years!" in the same way we might point out a bear in the woods while white water rafting.

And that's perfectly fine because the reason we only have a fleeting moment to celebrate another anniversary is because we are too busy having a fulfilled marriage. Being with each other, taking care of the house, taking care of four kids, a dog. The level of busy here is about two ticks past sanity on the scale so making it all work means we are perfectly happy to point at the non five year anniversaries as we go by.

As far as this year is concerned, the arrival of Ephram has been our greatest cause of celebration. In many ways it has been a four month long celebration of his entrance into our family. Our trip to Korea, which strikes us both as still somewhat surreal to us that we actually went there, was a little like a second honeymoon for us. More than that, when Heather and I got married, having kids was an important piece to making our family complete. In that respect while we may not have enjoyed a night out or "done something special" in the traditional sense, adopting Ephram and on the day of anniversary having a birthday party for him is as much a celebration of our life together as anything else.

Our love for each other has endured now eleven years in marriage and almost fourteen altogether. It has been expressed in various ways over the years from silly inside jokes to four kids. On our anniversary amid friends and family watching a one year old delicately play with chocolate cake was the ultimate expression of our love for each other and how wonderful this life we have built together is.