365 days of marriage
Last February, Loui and I spent a weekend in Nashville as a miniature honeymoon. On a relatively warm afternoon, we found a place to play pickleball, then we visited Centennial Park.
Once we found a particular bench, I sat down and read, while Loui took photos from all angles.
“Is that the Taylor Swift bench?” a stranger called as he walked past.
Indeed it was, dedicated to Taylor Swift by the city of Nashville because of these lyrics in her song “invisible string”:
Green was the color of the grass
Where I used to read at Centennial Park
I used to think I would meet somebody there
…
Last April, Loui went early with me to my new office at the University of Kentucky, to help me decorate my office. He stood on a chair to tie up a yellow strand with little poofs, a decoration that had already moved from one Kentucky State University office to another and now to a UK office.
It originally hung in my KSU cubicle, put up as a surprise for my 23rd birthday. I had always assumed that Ashley, my boss, had done the birthday decorations herself. Turns out someone else helped her: Loui.
Anyone who knows Loui knows that he’s always willing to help someone else—one of the first things I admired about him as a colleague and friend. So it’s no surprise that he offered to help his longtime friend decorate the cubicle of one of her employees, even one he barely knew yet. And he specifically remembered fluffing and hanging the yellow strand.
“That makes sense,” I said. “I tried to put up the same decoration once, and I couldn’t make the poofs look good. Only you could do that.”
Once, Loui had hung that decoration for a colleague. More than two-and-a-half years later, he hung it in a new office for his wife.
So there it was: our literal, not invisible, string.
…
This morning, I said I needed to remember to write my newsletter for today.
Loui, knowing I must be writing about our relationship, immediately gave me my headline: “365 days of marriage.”
Tomorrow is our first wedding anniversary, and we plan to celebrate by returning to the bookstore where we exchanged our vows. But 2024 was a Leap Year, giving us one extra day in our first year of marriage and meaning today marks 365 days. It has been a privilege and a joy to be Loui’s wife for every single one.
Time, wondrous time