How do I love thee...let me count the ways....

This October will mark 25 years of marraige. At some point it seems that we both became so comfortable with each other that some of the romance has been lost. Heather who is in a rather new relationship by comparison (less than 3 years) recently went through an exercise where she and her boyfriend listed all of the reasons they loved each other. What a novel idea I thought, but as I began to ponder the same, I realized that when love was new and exciting it was easy to come up with such a list, and as time goes by you take certain things and each other for granted -making the list harder to come by. Then just this week I finished reading a book called "The Wednesday Letters" by Jason F. Wright, (an excellent read by the way), and on one anniversary the one character sends a letter listing all of the things he loves about his wife. What are the odds on this? Two separate unrelated incidents involving the exact same thing, must be a sign right? So I have decided that since I have several months to come up with the actual compete list, and I can add as I go along new ones I come up with....

1) I love you because you always give me the pickles off your plate (yes Heather I stole this, but your Dad has always done this as well.)

2) I love you because you choose to sleep out in the living room or in the guest room when I am really tired, so that your snoring doesn't wake me up.

3) I love you because you ask me to join you in the same room, even if we are doing different things.

4) I love you because in 25 years I can only recall a couple of times you ever had a negative response about a dinner I served you, or when you had to serve yourself, because I had made other plans.

5) I love you because when you laugh, your whole face lights up, and the sound vibrates through out the whole house....like when you watch Police Academy or Three Stooges. I wish you laughed more often tho....

6) I love you because from the day we met, you have always been a gentleman and put the lid down. Over the years it is definetly one of the things I have taken for granted, and have found myself coming up wet when we stay over someplace where that is not the house rule.

7) I love you because you are always willing to drive, whether its just to the restaurant or on a long distance trip.

8) I love you because you are understanding of my need to be at every practice, every game, every event that our children are involved in, even if this takes away from "our time". They are only this age once, and I don't want to miss a minute of their lives, that they are willing to share with me.

9) I love you because you understand my need to exercise, eat right,etc...and though I probably obsess over this from time to time, you have taken it in stride and have even begun to drink that 1% milk, which you swore would never happen.

10) I love you because you are willing to relinquish most items to be under my control, since I am controlling by nature. I apologize for the times I have overstepped the bounds.

11) I love you because you were willing to do the bike ride down the Mtn. in Hawaii at some unbelievable hour under ungodly temperatures, just because I had heard it was the sight of a lifetime.

Here's to you....I love you.