Once, I congratulated myself for finding a good deal- paying for a discount card that allowed me to get an additional free drink for every paid drink for the first twenty redemptions. What a steal!
Cliff borrowed my card once. And lost it.
He lost it!
I simmered for days, carefully keeping score of the transgression, taking every opportunity to rub salt into his wound, only to return home one day discovering our fridge almost broken down, its contents reeking with putrefaction.
I’d forgotten to close the fridge door.
My face burned with embarrassment as I confessed my err.
With all the forgiveness that I should have extended to him in the first place, Cliff smiled back at me wordlessly, eyes twinkling with the good humor of an unspoken “We’re even.”
Are we?
It’s been 7 weeks post-spine surgery, and recovery is still a long journey. But you’ve never kept tabs, never blamed me for burdening you. “Burden? I like carrying you,” you’d quip.
You’ve always believed in the parts of me I couldn’t, reining me back when I’m headstrong and pushing me forward when I want to give up.
Eleven years ago marked a key hallmark of our marriage- when it rained on our garden wedding, showing us that in spite of life’s most inexplicable disappointments and unanswerable moments, we would be there for each other, and God, for us.
I’m grateful that, in spite of all of the ways I might have disappointed you and been a burden, especially with recent surgery and months of rehab ahead, that you’ve always maintained that finding me was “a good deal and the best deal” you secured next to knowing Jesus.
So no, we’re not even.
I owe a debt of love to you- look who has the good deal after all. 😉
Here’s to trying to break even for the rest of our lives. 💛
Happy 11th Anniversary, @cliff.tam 💛