Happy Birthday Jeff

4/7/2014

Today, my hubby joins the ranks of being a card carrying Medicare recipient.  Yup, he's NOW 65!  Neither Jeff nor I can believe he's reached another major milestone along our journey together.  When we started out as newlyweds, we were 25 and 24 years old and pretty wet behind the ears.  Compared to the mountains of knowledge we learned along the way, as well as our life experiences,we really knew nothing when we were first married.

As a divorced woman with one child, Jeff was a godsend that my Dad and his sister sent my way.  I can still remember Jeff taking me to the grocery store.  I pushed my cart and only put the most basic of food inside - day old bread, some milk, stuff like that.  I had a budget, and it was a very small budget.  Jeff, on the other hand, was pushing his own cart and was filling it up with all kinds of food including things like cookies.  I remember when we got to the checkout and I looked at his basket, I remember telling him that there was no way I could pay for all that food.  That's when he told me that he was paying for ALL the groceries.  I could have cried with gratitude.  

Some how Jeff found out that I had a dress on layaway at a department store (Mom probably told him) and the next thing I know he had paid for my dress.  Talk about a Knight in shining armor!

Over the course of 39 years, we have had plenty of adventure and share memories.  Not all our memories are good ones, but they are ours nonetheless.  When we lived in California, we went each summer to the beach for a week, went into Los Angeles with friends to see plays and stop at a real bagel shop to get fresh bagels on our way home.

We took the boys to Carlsbad Caverns, the Grand Canyon and Yosemite.  Jeff and I were lucky enough to spend ten days weeks in Hawaii and fell in love with the island of Maui, and never wanted to leave!

Jeff gave my Dad and I a trip to England, Scotland and Wales shortly after we were married, and he paid for everything. There are no words to describe how much the trip meant to Dad and I.  We had a wonderful time together and it was really the last time that he and I had so much alone time together.  

We bought our first little (emphasis on little) house and after moving in, discovered that the backyard was almost completely overgrown with bamboo.  You know how lovely a potted bamboo is in your house - well bamboo given a chance outside will take over everything.  Before Jeff and his friends could machete their way through, some bamboo was even able to grow through a crack in a wall and came inside the house!  

We celebrated one anniversary on the Queen Mary, which is dry docked in Long Beach.  It was a luxurious waste of money some would say.  When we walked along the decks, I swear I could feel the boat moving and for me with a vivid imagination, we weren't just jostling against the dock.  No we were out on the open sea traveling somewhere far away from home.

Once we settled in Maryland, our new home was much bigger and soooooo much better than the house in California, and 28 years later we're still in that house.  You can see we don't do change often.

We eventually began spending two weeks at the beach with the boys and their friends and those were marvelous times.  I know that the boys remember those days at the beach as fondly as we do.

The most extravagant thing we have ever done is to buy the plane.  The plane has taken us to the Bahamas, which was an amazing trip.  Jeff volunteers for Hero flights, where he will fly a disabled Veteran to a different hospital for treatment or return him home after treatment.  Those flights are happy and sad for him all at the same time.  Sad because the veteran is disabled in some way and happy because sometimes the flights are just so the veteran can go home.  These flights fill his heart with joy for the good things he's doing for someone else.

All marriages have ups and downs and 2013 was our worst down and yet we solder on.  Jeff has never given up on me, even when I try his patience to the core.  For this I am grateful.

Our journey together is not over, we're just entering a new chapter. We're retired, reluctantly for Jeff, and there are no claims on our time.  With the help of the plane, we can go anywhere and any time - and it doesn't get better than that.

Jeff, you have been my rock for all these years and I cannot adequately put into words how much I love you.  It means everything to me that you love me and have and will continue to take such wonderful care of me.  I am a very fortunate woman to have someone who cares for me so deeply and pushes all the obstacles in my road to recovery aside for me.

I remember Dad telling me while we were dating that you were a keeper.  Dad was right and you have proved it to me over and over again.

I love you.

P