As if our Arizona trip could be any more special this particular day marks 20 years married to the man of my dreams. To mark the occasion I booked a special "couples message" in the hotel spa. What that amounts to is that two message therapists work on two clients in the same room.
This was pretty cool.
What a way to treat yourself for 20 years of bliss. Punctuate it with more bliss. Even though we were in the same room we were both pretty quiet as our therapists did their work, leaving us literally unable to move when the session was over. Bryan and I laughed as we each tried to pry ourselves up off of our tables knowing that our therapists were waiting outside the door. We dressed and were greeted with a couple of glasses of sparkling cider in little champagne glasses and "congratulations". Taking our time (truly time had stopped) we each used the spa steam rooms and met for lunch in the hotel restaurant. Later that day we took the cameras and went hunting for the perfect shot of the moon (full moon on our anniversary). This became the ultimate joke as the moon kept moving and although we waited with cameras rolling for the moon to rise at the published time, alas we got no moon.
So finally we quit and ran back to the hotel to change for our night out atCucina Rustica.
This is where my husband broke a promise.
We had agreed not to do gifts (even though I booked the massage-that doesn't count) he pulled out a little black box.
Ok, some back story here. Picture two kids twenty years earlier struggling to get through college, dirt poor, etc. When we knew we wanted to get married I was making jewelry and gave Bryan a wax ring design to cast as my engagement ring. He had it cast with a cubic zirconia as the stone. I was not into diamonds anyway, and honestly the fact that it wasn't a real diamond actually seemed more romantic at the time-we loved each other that is what mattered. He and I against the world, and that sort of thing. So over a plate of potato skins (cuz that is all we could afford at the time) at a TJIFs he proposed with the ring that I had made.
Years went by and being the jeweler that I was I added another stone-an amethyst (Daniel's birth stone) after Daniel was born. More years went by and after 12 years of metalsmithing taking a tole on my hands I stopped wearing the ring because it first became uncomfortable and then it ceased to fit.
Fast forward twenty years and you can guess what was in the little black box.
A perfect diamond wedding band.
What can I say my husband has always been a romantic.
So now I have a diamond ring AND twenty years of bliss to back it up. The stones in my new ring are truly beautiful but they pale in comparison to being cherished like a jewel which has been my husband's greatest gift to me. My ring is so pretty but what it symbolizes is what makes it really special, the love that we have expressed for twenty years that seemed to pass in a blink. And it symbolizes the next part of our journey together.
Bryan I love you so much I don't have the words. And I forgive you for the broken promise.;-)
Happy anniversary my love.
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