...to Remember Romance

My husband would not ever be mistaken for a starry-eyed romantic. Before earning two degrees in electrical engineering, he was a paratrooper in the 82nd Airborne Division and served as a Special Forces operative. He used to joke that he could kill a man with a blade of grass. Cary Grant he is not. But I had fallen in love with this man because beneath the surface, all was not what it seemed.

Shortly after we were first married and had moved into our first home together, we hired contractors to rebuild our creosote - infused chimney. Think burnt wood left to rot and ferment. It was stinky, dangerously noxious, and needed to go long before we began building a family. This highly contentious topic had spawned tensions with the previous home-owners, incited arguments with insurance agents, and inspired conversations that included dismissive comments from chimney cleaners about the unavailability of "micro-scrubbers." It was not an auspicious beginning to our first home ownership. We finally despaired of saving the chimney by merely cleaning it and resolved to having it replaced.

Weeks later when our brand new chimney stood tall next to our house, my husband climbed onto the roof to inspect the job from above. Satisfied we had a stable, plumb, and creosote-free chimney, he rushed into the house, suddenly grabbed my arm, and pulled me outdoors.

"What are we doing?" I demanded.

"You'll see."

As we neared the only handy access to the roof, I dug in and stomped more like a petulant child than a new wife.

"I don't wanna go to the roof!"

"Come on. You'll be fine." And he helped me onto a low-slung roof access next to the deck.

Hunching down, I breathlessly tried a more rational approach and explained that I didn't need to see the new chimney; I was sure it was fine. Reluctantly climbing higher, I tried for sympathy and reminded him of my fear of heights. Reminding me that he was a paratrooper and clearly not afraid of heights, he pulled me onto the second story rooftop.

Now I was starting to get annoyed. I could observe the new chimney very well, thank you, with my feet planted safely on the ground. I trusted his assessment and frankly didn't care what it looked like from above, certainly not enough to risk life and limb climbing to the apex of my house, stooped over, wobbling in the knees, and teetering with vertigo!

And then I saw it:  the wet cement on top of the chimney and the little stick he had picked up before he had grabbed me. How could I be mad at him? So there we stood, clinging to each other on top of our first home, carving our initials in the cement before it dried. There those initials will remain until the house or the chimney crumbles to the ground.

AGP + GAB 

 

The Italian Mama thought about this little bit of newlywed romance the night before we moved out of this "starter home" that we had lived in for twenty-one years. Oddly, this memory didn't make me sad or wistful. Thinking about that sunny afternoon so many years ago, when I yielded to my husband's confident grasp, made me excited to begin a new journey, in a new state, in a new home where we will also leave our mark.