Birthdays, Babies and Brides

The Next Great Adventure: A True Story

Birthdays, Babies and Brides

We moved to Plano, TX in 1992 and lived there until 2016, twenty-four years. We owned two different houses and 10 different vehicles, 3 of which are still in the fleet. Cindy worked for Oxy the entire time. I made a major career change and worked for eight different companies. We had one child, Griffin. We joined a church, Bentwood Trail Presbyterian Church. We lost three of our four parents. We had hail storms, a kitchen fire, termites, and remodeling projects. I built a fish pond at one house and had a pool built at the other. Both homes were always open to friends and family and one of our great pleasures was being able to provide them a place to stay, whether it was for a vacation, a relocation, or simply escaping their own remodeling project.

And we celebrated. We celebrated everything. Birthdays. Babies. Brides. Going away parties. Graduation parties. Welcome to Texas parties. We had a party to build a fence and a party for a visiting New York Metropolitan Opera lyric soprano. We hosted bible studies, church youth group parties and impromptu swim parties. And Christmas, well, it was truly a season and not just a holiday at our house.

This was, of course, all Cindy's doing. She loved being the hostess, providing that celebratory

atmosphere, giving people an easy place to have a good time. Once we got to Plano, with family near and Cindy's 'everyone is family' attitude, the celebrations became habit. It was what we did. It was not easy for me to make that change. It's hard enough for me to put on my extrovert costume and go to a party, much less host one, especially the way that Cindy did it, where everything was planned from the themed napkins to the separate kid & adult beverage coolers to the parking. But, it made her happy and I, eventually, learned how to be her trusty hosting sidekick.

There are many, many Plano stories, maybe a lifetime's worth, so in figuring out what to say about the Plano years I knew I could not, practically, cover it all. Looking back I realized that the theme of those years was celebration. There was always something to celebrate today, always the next thing to celebrate tomorrow. Even the times of mourning became times to gather, remember, and be grateful. Every celebration happened with the knowledge that my partner, my right hand, would be either leading or supporting the effort, not out of obligation, but from a sincere love and desire to make others happy.

We had grown from impetuous young lovers, learning about each other and how to live together, to comfortable, dependable partners, able to handle all that life throws at you, together. There were many times I missed the passion and excitement of the early years, too many perhaps. It's only on looking back that I realize what a blessing it was to have such a comfortable, constant, competent spouse. I loved her so much. I never told her that enough. It was like breathing, unnoticed and easy until you can't. Then you panic. Then you struggle. Then you force yourself to relax and remember how to breathe, what it felt like, thinking about the effort it takes, wondering if you will ever breathe so easily again.

I can't tell every Plano story. I can't describe everything that happened; it's more musical score than

narrative. I can't explain how we changed over the years; it would be better suited to a multi-season TV series than the stack of snapshots I could write here. I do plan on writing some of the impact stories, the course changing ones, but for this introduction to the Plano years, I want to focus on what I do remember about how to breathe, the common, simple things that kept us alive and moving forward.

She would fall asleep on my shoulder. I would smell her hair, kiss her forehead, wondering how in the world she could be comfortable in that position, and then gently push her off to her side of the bed before my shoulder went permanently asleep. Sometimes she would wake up and chastise me, "oh, you don't love me anymore?" before giving me a peck and rolling over to her side. Sometimes I would get that last bit of instruction, "don't forget you need to take care of that thing about the thing tomorrow" and somehow I would know exactly what she meant. Sometimes she wouldn't wake, exhausted, and I would kiss her behind the ear and say "love you more" because I knew that was the only time I would get the last word.

She would fall asleep on the sofa. After a long day at work and a glass of cabernet, she would lounge on the sofa in her pajamas, watching some frivolous TV show and then announce, "I'm going to bed after I watch the weather." She rarely made it to the weather report on the 10 o'clock news, much less through the forecast. I'd wake her up when I was ready to go to bed, usually giving her some bogus information on how the TV show ended or tomorrow's weather forecast. If she was really tired and the bed was cold I'd lay on her side of the bed to warm it up for her before she crawled in, and I would get "Aw, you still love me!" and my good night kiss.

Anytime I cooked, she cleaned, especially if it was a party. Part of it was to keep some control of the chaos, and part of it was to be in the middle of the action, keeping tabs on who needed what. One of my favorite things was to come up behind her at the sink, when she was elbow deep in soap suds, squeeze her butt cheek and nuzzle her neck. Sometimes I got pushed away with soapy hands. Sometimes I got my own butt cheek squeezed. Every once in a while she would grab both of my hands with her soapy ones, pull them tight around her waist, turn her head and whisper in my ear, "Later."

I never knew what might happen when she would unexpectedly come sit in my lap. Sometimes, she just draped her arm around my neck and said nothing, just staking her claim to me. Other times she would look me in the eye with raised eyebrows letting me know that I was too loud, or had had too much to drink, or was telling an inappropriate story. But most often it was sliding onto my lap, getting my attention, kissing me and then saying something sexy like "Why don't you take out the trash?"

A partner who loves you, who tries to understand you, may not always get everything right, but because they love you the mis-steps are easily forgiven. When my father died, Cindy assumed I would struggle and was overly solicitous. She was assuming I would react like her and would need to be supported, carried. What I really needed was time alone, to sort things out, to understand the impact this would have on me. Cindy struggled with how to support me. I struggled with how to explain to her that I just needed to be left alone, something she didn't understand because her comfort was in friends and family. Just days after my father's burial we went to the Trail Dust Steak House outside of Denton, Texas with a group of our new church friends. The event had been planned for a few weeks and Cindy thought it would be good for us to go. I'm not sure our new friends even knew my father had died. We weren't that close, yet. At one point Cindy handed the band a song request, Bob Wills' "Faded Love." Not long into the first verse I got up, went outside, sat on a "hitching post" in the parking lot, and began to cry. Shortly, Cindy came out, sat beside me, held my hand and said "Let me know when you're ready to go back in." Though she didn't know what I needed at first, she figured it out and did and said the perfect thing. That was my partner for you.

"Which ones, the pumps or the flats?" "Which ones, the dangly ones or the studs?" "Which one, the scarf or the hat?" The 'which one' question was fairly regular in our getting ready for work or to go out routine. Cindy would pull out two pairs of shoes or two sets of earrings and ask, "Which ones?" Early on the question petrified me, how should I know which one to choose? Later, it annoyed me because I did not know if she was asking me which one I preferred, or which one would look better for the occasion. Again, how would I know? Eventually, with enough experience on her preferences, my preferences, and how she would want to present herself, whether at work or for an evening out, I was able to answer with confidence "The pumps" or "I like the dangly ones." Since I nearly always liked the dangly ones, I knew she was just asking to let me think I had a say but it was one of our things, the things we did that reinforced working together.

"Scratch my back." "Massage my shoulders." "Rub my head." It seems like Cindy made one of those requests every night. A lot of husbands might interpret this invitation to touching as a precursor to certain activities, but I learned early on that she wasn't being coy. Her back itched or her shoulders ached or her head hurt and she needed to get past that and get to sleep. If I have a super power, it may be the ability to put a woman to sleep quickly, as evidenced by all the sleeping described here. For years I thought of it as more of a curse than a super power, until Cindy explained that it wasn't boredom that put her to sleep, it was comfort and security and peace.

The last few years I rarely got those requests. Between surgeries and chemo and general fatigue, her greatest relief came from being still, in a comfortable position, not from being touched or held. When the cancer first came back it was in her bones, specifically in her sternum and her right 8th rib near the spine. It was painful. There was nothing I could do to comfort her, except make sure she took her meds and figure out a comfortable way for her to sleep. Six months after metastasis her sternum and rib were basically dissolved. It was a constant struggle to manage pain meds to their best effectiveness. For my part, I worked very hard at being patient and understanding and her comfort became my primary focus. For her part, she was strong and brave and rarely gave in to despair. She made it easy for me to take care of her, as easy as she could. All of this was possible not because we had special skills or positive attitudes, but because that's just how we did things. We had practiced breathing together that way for decades. It was all very natural.

The daily ritual, the routine, that rhythm of life that moves you along from one day to another, from one adventure to the next, it has to be powered by something. It seems to me that the quality of your life depends a great deal on what you choose to power your daily, routine breathing with. For us, it was celebration, or even more basically, gratitude. We were grateful to have each other, to have love to share. Sharing love with another inspires you to seek and accept grace elsewhere. Grace allows you to let yourself be loved. Once you know you are loved, you can be a blessing to others in many ways, like celebrating with them, partnering with them, caring for them. 

Gratitude. Love. Grace. Blessings. Yes, this is God language, a fundamental place to find your breath.

Genesis 2:7 - then the Lord God formed man from the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and the man became a living being.