Here’s to Happiness: A Love Story (Part 2)

In the beginning of any relationship, there’s always a fog, a mist of disillusionment, where you put the best parts of who you are on display so that the other person doesn’t realize you’re actually nuts and should be institutionalized. Yeah, I didn’t do that. I decided to share all the ugly and scary parts of my life with this man, and if he decided he didn’t want to be a part of my life, that was his choice to make. Luckily for me, it worked out in my favor: apparently Mark is here for the loco cocoa that I was serving. Ha!

So, after dating for a few weeks and really getting to know one another, I invited him home for Christmas to meet my family. I had never done this before, and in my head, I knew it could go one of two ways: either he’d run for the hills, or run to the alter (in prayer, not to get married, obviously; we are a wild bunch!) So, without any preemptive explanations of what to expect, we walk into my childhood home to a loud burst of electric energy and boisterous explosions of laughter and were greeted with hugs and kisses and introductions. Oh, also, a bit about Mark, he’s an introvert. He’s good with one-on-one conversations, but he usually observes more than jumps in and commands the attention of the room. I’m clearly the complete opposite. I demand to be seen and heard, and most of my family is the same way, especially my daddy.

So, after about ten minutes of meets and greets at the Huckaby Hoopla, Mark discreetly joins me in the kitchen and says in my ear, from behind my back, like a covert ninja, “Is your dad a twin?”

I turn around to face my sneaky boyfriend who has both seduced me in the kitchen of my childhood home, rather uncomfortably in front of my momma, who thankfully was busy making herself a cup of coffee and didn’t notice my face blushing, but also startled me by his stealthy inquisition because I hadn’t realized he had snuck in.

“Oh! I forgot to tell you! Yeah, dad’s a twin. Cleve and Steve. Cleve is my dad. He’s the louder of the two.” Then I grabbed his hand and led him to the living room where all the men were gathered and announced, “Dad! I forgot to tell Mark you were a twin!”

Mark says, “Yeah, I saw you, and then I turned around and saw you again in a different shirt and I got a little confused.”

Everyone busted out in laughter. They liked this kid. Mark sat down with the guys and listened as dad captivated his audience with stories and jokes, entertaining as he always is at any gathering, and I walk back into the kitchen and share with the ladies what just transpired. A few minutes later, I walk into the living room to offer Mark a drink and I hear the tail end of a story about “skid marks”. My mouth drops open and I stare at my father who is laughing at his own recollection.

“Daddy! What are you talking about?!?”

“Skid marks! In your underwear! When you fart and poop comes out a little bit,” he replies nonchalantly, as if this is a normal topic of conversation.

“Oh my gosh! This is your first time meeting my boyfriend and this is the topic of your choosing?!”

The guys are busting out in laughter. They think it’s hilarious, and I’m mortified. My brother was falling out of his chair, about to pee his pants from laughing so hard. Mark was on the couch, trying to hold back tears. My uncles were both roaring in laughter and I was just standing there, hands on my hips, shaking my head.

“Can you try not to embarrass me, please?” I ask, but dad just waves me off like an annoying fly swarming his watermelon.

The night rolls on and we partake in all our annual traditions; we play Dirty Santa, exchange gifts, and take family photos. Then, Stephanie, my dad’s twin’s oldest daughter, whom I refer to as “my twin”, says, “Let me get a picture of you and Mark!”

Snap, click, flash! Our first Christmas photo and suddenly it became part of our own Christmas tradition.

After we left my parents’ house and I was driving him home, I apologized profusely for the inappropriateness of the topics of conversation. “My dad thinks he’s funny,” I tried to blow off how witty he is, and how much I share his sense of humor. “He always has to entertain,” I continued. In reality I knew we were the exact same person, but I didn’t want Mark to know that, just yet.

“What are you talking about? I had a blast. Your dad is hilarious” he responded.

Oh, thank God! He likes my favorite person on earth! This may actually work out.

The following week Mark and I take “couples photos” because why not, right? It’s official. He’s my boyfriend. So, January 2nd, 2012, I’m sitting at home on my laptop editing the photos and I immediately call my sister.

“Savannah!”

“What?!” She responds with equal enthusiasm and wonderment.

“I think I’m in love.”

“Wait, you what?!”

“I’m pretty sure,” I begin as tears roll down my cheeks, “I’m in love with this man. Savannah, I’m going to marry him.”

“Ash, dude. You’ve been dating for like two minutes.”

“Van, I know but it just feels right. Let me send you this picture.”

I send her a picture that I just finished editing. It’s one where we’re laying on an old train track with our heads on each other’s shoulders, legs crossed on opposite sides, and my hand is resting against his cheek, and we’re both laughing at how uncomfortable we are as we lay there in the position. In this moment of touching up the photo, I can picture a ring on my empty hand. I envision a life of laughter with this man laying beside me, and in my heart, I just know. It’s love.

“You’re not gonna tell him, are you? You can’t tell him first!”

“I’m not going to tell him. I’m gonna wait,” I say, but I am bursting with emotions. All the feels. Here they are on display. Savannah expresses her excitement for me and hopes he feels the same way.

Early on in our courtship, Mark and I start talking about the future. Before feelings of love are expressed, before our first kiss, but right around the time I told him the whole “Benjamin Story”, we shared what we wanted in the future. We talked about our future house, our future kids (yes, I said kids… now, I know you guys are thinking, “Didn’t you and Eddie break up because you didn’t want kids and he did, and now you want kids with this guy you’ve been dating for four minutes?” And yes, you’d be correct, but the difference is, I wasn’t in love with Eddie. I loved him as a person. But it was different with Mark. From the very beginning, it was just different.) So he said he wanted three, I said maybe one (I was thinking about the pain of pushing a child out my vagina and I literally winced in agony). Eventually we decided that if I had twins, which I really hoped would happen, I’d have one more. That seemed like a compromise he could agree with, and I’d just take a lot of meds and get some good drugs before pushing out a kid. So, we started talking about names of our future kids, schools they would attend. Mark went to a private Christian school and wanted his kids to attend there as well. Tuition is quite expensive, but he suggested it would be less if I worked there. Since I had previous experience with kids during Master’s, that made sense to me and was a very feasible option.

During those months of laying the foundation of our relationship, we also discussed our favorite things to do. I expressed how much I enjoyed games and puzzles, word searches, sudoku, word scrambles and trivia. I told him how much I enjoyed traveling and expressed my wanderlust spirit: exploring new places, discovering new things, and embarking on new adventures. I told him I loved things that might not be obvious at first, but that is meticulously thought out, and evident in discovery later on, a story that unfolds as more information is shared. And I watched as a lightbulb switched on in his mind.

“Oh, I have the perfect idea for a proposal! I saw a pastor from my church do this for his wife and I always thought it was incredible.”

“Tell me!” I insisted.

“No way! I want to use his idea and I don’t want you to know anything about it,” he said, adamantly.

We talked about this incredible book that I read while in Master’s entitled, “The Five Love Languages” by Curtis Chapman. If you haven’t read this book, it is a must-read and is part of the foundation of our relationship. Not only in the beginning, but throughout our future, and I suggest it to every couple I know. It basically explains that there are five ways in which a person can give love and receive love: acts of service (AOS), quality time (QT), physical touch (PT), words of affirmation (words of aff), or the giving and receiving of gifts (gifts). There’s a test at the end of the book where you determine which language is your primary love language, and most people have a secondary love language as well. Very few people have more than two. I had already taken the test and read the book before so I knew mine were PT and Gifts. Meaning I like to be touched, not necessarily in a sexual manner, but more so in a caring, compassionate, loving way. I want to hold hands; I need hugs and kisses. That’s how my family greets each other and leaves each other, every time we gather together. That to me is love, and I love that so much! I love to be touched at the small of my back, a good foot massage, cuddles, and being wrapped in a loving embrace from behind my back. That’s why when Mark snuck up on me at my parents’ house in the kitchen during the Christmas party, my face turned red and I felt flushed with fever. Whew! Chills! Ha ha! But also, gifts. So, for me, I like to give sentimental gifts. I like a good theme, a thoughtful inclination, and imaginative conjure of a gesture of love, with no expectations of reciprocation.

Again, we go back to my childhood, where my dad would have a wad of cash in his pocket and a thick wallet and he’d call my sister, April, and I into the kitchen and say, “Okay, which one do you want? The wallet or the pocket full of cash?”

April would always choose the pocket, which usually had several fifties, lots of twenties but mostly smaller bills. But I always chose the wallet. Now the wallet might have a few twenties, a couple tens, maybe some fives, but it also had a secret compartment that I knew housed the hundreds. So, when we went to discover how much spending money we had for our impending shopping spree, I pulled out the hundreds from the hidden compartment! It was a fun little game, a puzzle, that ultimately led into lots of fun gifts. Which was a love language that April and I both shared. We both loved expensive, designer handbags and our closets have always been bursting at the seams with beautiful clothes. And because dad’s primary love language is gift giving, he enjoyed taking his girls out as much as we enjoyed going on our little dates.

I determined in our conversations about our specific love languages, however, that Mark didn’t have the same materialistic passions that I had. In fact, you could tell by his choice of clothing that he was very basic, for lack of a better term. He wore jeans and a black T-shirt every day. He had other clothes in his wardrobe, but they were not fashion forward, and definitely not anything I liked. But his primary love languages are quality time and acts of service. So, we don’t speak the same languages. Which is not surprising since we are opposites in every other aspect of life. That just means we would have to work hard at learning to speak the language we each required.

Quality time isn’t hard to give. My momma is quality time, and since my relationship with Mark is so similar to that of my parents, I knew it could work. My dad is extroverted and wild, funny and the life of the party. He always has something witty to say and tries to put a smile on everyone’s face. My momma grounds him. She is his anchor. She is his stability. She takes the wild whims of dad’s imagination and reels it in to reality and functionality. And I always call Mark the calm to my storm. We balance each other out.

It’s the acts of service that I knew would create the most trouble for me. I’m a pretty independent person by nature. I don’t require much help or assistance. If I don’t know how to do something, I ask or figure it out myself, but I don’t want someone to do it for me. It’s the “boss” mentality. I am so much like my dad. My dad and my uncle are co-owners of a flooring business that they’ve had for over 30 years. I learned to take initiative and operate with authority from his example; since he rarely asked for help and would “take care of it himself,” I learned to do the same.

I remember one night after making Mark my incredible homemade lasagna, he finished his plate, and waited for me to finish my own. He eats extremely fast. I seriously doubt he ever even tastes what he’s eating. There’s no way he enjoys his food. But after I was done, he grabs my plate and brings it to the kitchen sink and my mouth falls open.

“What are you doing?” I ask as he begins to run water over our plates.

“Oh, I figured I’d clean a little since you cooked.”

My eyes were as big as saucers as I stared at him in shock. Never has anyone ever offered to do that for me. I was used to cooking and cleaning for myself. I was self-reliant (to this extent), I was self-sufficient (by all intents and purposes), and I didn’t need a man to wash my dishes. But I began to see that he needed to wash my dishes to show that he appreciated the meal I made for him.

So, inevitably, our first Valentine’s Day rolls around and I did it. I told him that I love him. There was nothing I could do about it. The man washes my dishes. He takes out my trash. He shows me love in his language every time we are together. I had to let him know that I felt the way I did. Well, I happened to be Mark’s first girlfriend, so he had never told anyone that he loved them before. He had never had those feelings and I wasn’t trying to pressure him into anything. I told him that there was no obligation for reciprocation and that I understood if he needed time to process his thoughts. He’s a methodical thinker, like most intellectuals, where I’m more of a free-spirited feeler. Again, complete opposites.

The following day he spends time talking to one of his best friends, Matthew Best, and they comb through his thoughts and emotions. I don’t exactly know the details of the conversation because when I asked about it Mark was extremely vague, but ultimately they determined that he was in love with me as well. That evening he expressed those feelings towards me.

Our courtship was long. So so very long. We moved me from my tiny one bedroom apartment into an apartment with my little sister Savannah, then eventually I moved into his childhood home with him. We went on trips and vacations together with friends and family. We elaborately celebrated holidays and anniversaries with travel and fine dining and gifts. There was a lot of physical touch during our quality time, ha ha, and we just really developed our connection. We both knew the ultimate goal very early on, the blueprints were drawn, the foundation laid, and I was ready for the next steps: the infamous, and much awaited proposal!

Now, long before Mark was in the picture, my dad and uncle bought a piece of farmland. It was a large lot, 350-plus acres of land with several structures and pastures, a covered pavilion for gatherings with restrooms and a full kitchen. On the edge of the field were two trees that grew almost on top of each other, so close that their branches interlocked and formed what appeared to be one big tree. I remember seeing it for the first time and thinking about how it reminded me of marriage: two lives growing independently of one another, but intertwined and forming a life together.

I pointed to that tree as I toured the property with my dad and said, “That’s where I want to get married, under that tree!”

He replied jovially, “To who? You ain’t even dating nobody, baby. You gotta have a boyfriend first!”

I laughed and said, “Not now, daddy! But someday! Someday I wanna get married out there.”

“Okay, baby. We’ll see. If we still have the farm when that day comes, we’ll see about getting you married under those trees.” He smiled and continued the tour.

Since our courtship, Mark and I had been to the farm on multiple occasions, riding four wheelers through the trails, fishing in the lake, eating at cookouts and celebrating numerous birthdays and holidays. He was well acquainted with the story of “the wedding trees” and my desire to get married under them. And to him, it was a detail that didn’t require debate or discussion. Much like the date of the ceremony.

My paternal grandfather passed away years before I was born, but my grandmother married my Papa Don when I was young. He was the sweetest man and incredible pastry chef. He was married to my grandmother on March 21st, which ironically was one of the dates Mark and I had talked about, so when he passed away in the Fall of 2014, we decided to honor Papa Don by setting our date as the same as theirs, which, as luck would have it, fell on a Saturday the following year. The date was set!

I knew nothing about the proposal. It was all top secret. I spoke with Savannah every day and she never said anything. She never hinted, never gave any indication that she even knew anything was in the works, but she had a major role in helping him navigate his plan into action. One day, out of the blue, on his way to work, Mark comes into my bedroom and hands me a puzzle piece and says, “Your engagement starts now.”

“Wait, what? What is this?” I look down at a piece of a puzzle. On it was what looked like grass and a red line drawn on it.

Immediately I think it’s a clue to something and I had to find out what was going on, so I started to ask questions. Mark answers none of them and instead kisses me on the forehead and runs off to work.

While he’s at work, I begin to receive text messages with clues, little riddles that I had to figure out and they send me on a scavenger hunt through the house, collecting puzzle pieces. The following day, Savannah gives me a clue at work and I find a few more pieces and more clues. I spend the next couple days receiving puzzle pieces at restaurants, from my puppies, in my car, and even wrapped up as an early Christmas gift. Finally he tells me to go shopping and get whatever I want to wear when I have all the pieces, so I go and pick out a dress. It had a gold lace fabric over a a black poly-blend top, and has a black, shiny, taffeta high-low skirt. It’s beautiful and I feel super fancy! A couple days later he hands me a picture of us and instructs me to go there for my next clue. I took the picture and drove to the place we were when we took the photo and there was another photo and more puzzle pieces. I went to the next place and again found a photo and puzzle pieces. That one led me to another spot and finally home and the clue instructed me to get dressed. Today was the day: December 21, 2014!

Once I got to my dress there was a note that said not to worry, that he had stolen my puzzle and in order to add the final pieces and complete the puzzle I had to go to an address he had provided. Thank God for GPS because I no idea where I was going. It led me to a golf course at a country club and I started asking people if they knew where the location indicated on the picture was. When I walked down the hill to my final destination, there was a sign that said, “Will You Marry Me?” And had our initials on the bottom. I went down to the sign and when my back was turned to him, Mark snuck up behind me as he so often does, and got down on one knee. I turned around and he had my puzzle in his hand. He was wearing the most beautiful colored bright blue vest that we had picked out for our wedding, black dress pants and a black button down, and his curly hair was sweeping across his face. As it began to lightly sprinkle I saw in the pond behind us two swans swimming together. Mark had mentioned that swans are a sign of everlasting love, as they are one of the few animals who mate for life.

I placed the remaining pieces in the puzzle and he presented me with my great-grandmother’s diamond solitaire engagement ring, an heirloom I had been pining for since she passed away, years and years ago. It was set in a white gold band and posted high, making it’s brilliance twinkle as it was displayed in the antique navy velvet covered ring box. We both were in tears. I don’t remember any of the words he said, something about loving me and wanting to spend forever with me. He asked me to marry him and I quickly said, “Yes!” and he placed the ring on my finger! I leapt into his arms in a loving embrace.

I always tell Mark that he was the missing piece in my life; finding him completed my puzzle, and now I can see the picture perfectly.

A quote by Bonnie Arbor says, “You are the piece of the puzzle of someone else’s life. You may never know where you fit, but others will fill the holes in their lives with pieces of you.”