Idiosycratic Life

Okay, in general, I don’t talk about my love life on this site that often. But I am going to beg for Mushy Blog Entry Amnesty today, which is Stephen’s and my Four Year Dating Anniversary. I am hoping that this won't be as nauseating as the last entry. :) I can't believe how much has changed in our lives these past four years. Our lives, since we have been together, have had a tempo, a rise and fall of great joys and difficult struggles.

His grandparents died; his nephew Andrew was born.

Nanny got sick; Nanny is dying to start driving again.

I came back from Prague; together we went to England, Ireland, Scotland, the beach, the lake, the mountains and college.

I have been on 7 different psychotropic medications and lost and gained a total of 80 pounds all together, in either direction. I feel really healthy in mind, body and spirit, despite being somewhat… well, “eccentric” would probably be putting it mildly. :)

I cut all my hair off, grew it back, cut most of it off, dyed it red, dyed it back, and cut it all off again. Stephen had the same haircut since he was five, then had it shaped into an old man semi-circle for a role and sulked (legitimately, it was bad) for half-a-day before his director mercilessly decided his character should be completely bald, then grew it back somewhat and kept it short ever since. I think love is when you can Bic your boyfriend’s head twice a day- before a matinee and again before the 8:00 show- and then walk across campus with him wearing a black trench coat and tall, black snow boots, and both pray we don’t run into any of my women’s studies professors. :)

My work has been displayed in four exhibits, three magazines, and in and on an unknown number of newspapers and web sites (because of being on the wire.)

Stephen has performed in 12 shows. He has written 9 sketches, 7 monologues, a 1 one-act play, and countless drafts of beginnings I have never seen. He directed 3 shows and created an improv troupe. I have had 5 internships, did all the stuff I used to do at Isaac's: cook, waitress (excuse me, tron) and hostess, worked holiday retail, substitute taught, shot weddings and pets, and moved to Allentown, London, Syracuse, Lancaster, Harrisburg and Miami. He drove an ice-cream truck, worked in the box office of a theater in Boston, and now performs magic tricks in a giant top hat between auditions. His mom sold the home they grew up in and moved to Boston.

His brother was diagnosed with and eventually beat cancer for the second time.

My sister fell in love, went to law school and made law review. Then she started her MBA. His sister changed jobs three times (from a start-up job to a dot.com that boomed then busted and now a Good Grown-Up Job), bought half a house and got engaged.

We went to three weddings, including one where he had to wear a kilt, and that of my First Love. He saw his First Love on a subway in Boston when they simultaneously said, “Bless you,” to a woman sitting in the rows halfway between them, and they didn’t a word to each other.

We solemnly vowed to get out of bed, jog to the gym together and swim laps before class three different times, on three different “Health Kicks.” We never went. Not once.

He likes all the popsicle flavors that I don’t like. The way I see it, we have to get married someday, because with him not here… all I have left are the orange ones! :)

We have lived, at different times, four states away, five floors apart, six blocks down the street, 10 stops away on the Underground, and 1,500 miles apart. And yet, to me, “home” is wherever we are together.

And with all the good and all the bad, all we’ve accomplished and seen and performed and done and written and shot and printed, this relationship- keeping it healthy and strong and so much fun- is the best thing we’ve done. The best.

Thank you, Stephen. I love you. Happy anniversary!