Christmas Morning

I am getting new tires today. This has me extremely excited. I feel like a kid on Christmas morning. I like this part of myself; the part that still gets excited over simple things.

When I was dating my now ex-husband, I mentioned to a girlfriend how much I loved Peanut M/M's. I had no idea he was listening. He picked me up the next day and we went to a movie. He went to get popcorn and came back with Peanut M/M's. I was impressed.

Over the course of our "courtship" and subsequent marriage, in the beginning, anytime something big happened in my life, he would find a way to give me peanut M/M's. He never handed them to me, I had to find them. In a bookbag when I took my GED test, with flowers after giving birth, taped to a letter on my first day of college.

Peanut M/M's. They make me smile.

When I started dating B, I mentioned the M/M story. I have no idea how it came up but it did. A few days later, I open my purse to find a Snickers bar. It still makes me laugh that he tried to do something he knew I liked  before. But it wasn't the same. With B, I liked randomly finding notes or a letter from him. He worked on the railroad and was  gone a lot, so this was a way for me to still feel connected, even when he wasn't there.

And his t-shirt. An extra large shirt yellow shirt that hung to my knees. His cologne spritzed on it. I slept in that thing for months after we broke up. It's amazing how cologne lingers even after so many washings. Before, while dating, he was always back home by the time his cologne started to fade. But after a breakup, once the scent was gone, I threw it away. Along with all of his notes and cards.

I sometimes wish I had kept them. Just to remember a time when I fell in love without any reservations.

Each person who has come into my life for any length of time has left a part of themselves with me. Something unique to them or a moment that still makes me smile or laugh . . . a lot.

California buying me books and a journal. He was so excited to surprise me. So disappointed that I guessed. And that silly, silly Christmas tree. OUR Charlie Brown tree. I still find needles sometimes, two years after. Every year, around Christmas, when I'm putting up a tree, I still hear his laugh and hope he has found his way out . . . .

J and his kindness. His overwhelming kindness. And the first man to buy me shoes.

T....well, T stands out. Not because he was he love of my life and every relationship will always need to live up to him. No, not that at all. But T gave me orchids, a beautifully chaotic yet perfectly arranged bouquet of orchids. The most beautiful arrangement of Stargazer Lilies and orchids I have ever seen. I still laugh when I remember buckling the bouquet in and wrapping a blanket around it so they wouldn't fall.

It's movies that made me laugh:

ME: I bet he's crying because the emotional distress is too much and he can't take it anymore.
FRIEND: Or it could be the big shard of glass he just pulled out of his stomach.

It's a little boy on a search for his father's secret. I still wonder if I should have cried. But I'm grateful I laughed, a lot. I so need to laugh like that again and more often.

They were all so different. But each brought something into my life. Something necessary.

These are good memories; special memories.

And I don't regret a single one . . . .