Love After Babies

We lay next to one another completing a crossword before bed. “Habit wearer”…. “Nun”……

I confess, I always thought crosswords were for elderly people. Are we 30 going on 90?

They say the most solid relationships are the ones that grow together. Eventually, one might reach a certain point in their relationship when they wonder “how did we get here?” But I think maybe we were this way from the beginning.

My mind flashes back to that tiny college apartment where we’d snuggle up on the couch and watch planet earth until 1am, our roommates stumbling in from the bar as David Attenborough passionately narrated the effect the climate crisis had on migration patterns of flamingos. I was hooked. Those tipsy roommates would scoff at us, and I wonder now if it’s because they knew we’d found something that would last.

5 letters across…. “Consider everything”….. “in all”

All around us corrupt men try to grasp for more power, more money. But you deal in smiles. Our children’s laughter is your currency. I watch you sing silly songs, play pretend and tickle fight and I don’t think I’ve ever been more in love.

You live for moments of mercy. I’ll never regret it, choosing the man who takes his time to drive the immigrant family down the street to the grocery store, explaining the difference between green and red grapes.

“Inventor of lasik, last letter is M”….. “IBM?”

There was a time when we used to write love letters to one another and leave them in our school mail cubbies. Now we text about our baby’s diapers, grocery lists and school pick up duty, mostly.

“Let’s just pick up dinner at Costco” I text in the middle of the work day.

“Heck yea” you respond with a heart eyes emoji, like it’s still the most romantic suggestion.

When we were living apart you’d keep the phone line connected until I’d fallen asleep. Now I overhear you singing lullubies and telling fantastical bedtime stories to our babies.

The sum total of these ordinary moments is something quite extraordinary: The thread of our lives has woven our souls together. I will never not love you.

“7 letter word for always”….. “eternal”