This is a landmark year for my husband and me. In October, we will celebrate our 20th wedding anniversary. But even before that - in just a couple of days, on July 1 - we will mark the 25-year anniversary of our very first kiss. We consider that the beginning of it all.
Take a minute to look back: July 1, 1988. That was a long time ago. He was 18 and I was several months older at 19. Just kids, really. The local radio stations had Def Leppard's Pour Some Sugar on Me (ah, sweet poetry) on constant rotation, though Cheap Trick's The Flame was the number-one song that week. Big was in theaters; Coming to America was just released.
That summer, young folks were wearing acid-washed jeans. Mullets were at their peak (they have peaked, by the way ... so um, if you or someone you love still has one, please remove it). Girls had curly perms, big bangs and bad Sun In highlights.
And I had met a boy.
By late June, we had become good friends. He was painfully shy and I ... wasn't. So on that particular summer night, the first of July, when I'd had a hard time reading him or understanding his intentions, I just flatly asked him more out of curiosity than anything, "Are you going to kiss me tonight?"
"Maybe," he said.
Spoiler alert: He did.
We were opposites personality-wise, and we really didn't have a lot in common. But I made him laugh and he made me feel peaceful. We started dating and, well, a quarter of a century later, here we are: still balancing, complementing ... yes, completing ... one another.
We don't really "celebrate" this anniversary anymore. We'll just kind of take note on Monday, "Oh yeah. That's right." We'll smile about it and move on with our days. In October, we will celebrate our wedding anniversary in some way, even if it's just dinner out together.
Still, it's worth pausing to remember that the little things - a kiss, for example - can have the biggest impact.
And change everything.
This is so sweet.
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