There was never one moment that I recall where I fell in love. It wasn't the first kiss or first time we slept together or a string of words that made me realize he was "the One". There was, however, a moment that confirmed how I felt about him: waiting in the parking lot of the bar, touching up my eye liner and mascara, when I heard a song that brought me back sixteen years, playing in my back yard while my dad blared the same song out of the garage. Jimi Hendrix's "Red House" will forever in my mind make me think of Curve cologne while he taught me how to play pool and the feeling that I was right where I needed to be.
Now, after we survived out first year, my love for him has come down to the little things that make him, him that I look forward to everyday
-The wrinkles that form around his eyes when he smiles.
-The way his ears stick out when he puts his hat on backwards.
-The moments that he slaps my leg when he gets excited about tiny things or when he finds something stupid absolutely hilarious.
-How he makes me feel like no other woman in the world exists but me.
-The way his smell will always bring me back to when we first met.
-The way he ends everyday with "you wanna cuddle with me?" and starts everyday with "Morning beautiful!"
-The thrill in my heart that starts inside his eyes.*
-How my head hits his chest perfectly every time he hugs me.
Sometimes I'm still not sure I have been or am now in love but things seem to come together and make sense when he walks into the room. Yes, he has lied, hid things from me, is horrible with money, puts himself number one almost all the time and can't seem to wash all the dishes after dinner. He is sketchy and has an addictive personality that at times can lead him down a path that has otherwise been marked as dangerous. But when I'm stressed out, he makes me laugh and when I'm sad he puts things into perspective. I've never had so much fun with someone I was sleeping with and I have never been so scared to lose someone. I've always had this voice in my head telling me that if I was single life would be better and I would be able to concentrate on me. The idea of being responsible for me and no one else has always appealed to my better tastes but with him, with him things are different.
I make lists of things he needs to do so I don't have to drive, I cook us dinner every night and he does the dishes (most of them), I repeatedly put his shoes in the closet instead of the middle of the floor like he likes and I don't say anything about the stash of dishes he has on his side of the bed, I put his socks in the laundry hamper daily and he cleans the room when I have school, I take off his glasses every night when he falls asleep with them on and he stays in bed until I wake up on days off, I watch shows that I hate including 1,000 Ways to Die and Man vs. Wild but on road trips longer than 20 minutes we listen to at least one Britney Spears album, I buy NesQuick just to see the look on his face when he helps put away the groceries.
The point being that all the things I do for him don't seem like chores. For the first time in my life I want to make someone I sleep with happy, for the simple matter of seeing him happy. It's a strange feeling to have no background noise telling you how much better life could be, reminding you of the low points and the fights, repeating the lines, "I don't want to be with you anymore" hoping to stumble upon the courage to say them. I will admit it's hard to accept someone for who they are and love them anyway when they constantly make you insane. I'm not a firm believer in the fact that people change much after the age of 21 so I didn't count on changing him in any way. 10 years of doing what you want, when you want to isn't going to change because some 22 year old woman comes along and says it must be. I wasn't that ignorant going into it. And now it has become easier to see that you put with people's flaws when you love them because it's who they are. I don't like many people. There is a good, even probable chance that I don't like 90% of the people on my contact list or 99.6% of my "friends" on facebook (gross) and that I have probably talked shit on 100% of them, so when I see something in someone that attracts me to their personality there has to be something special there. And that's what I've held on to when he makes me want to commit capitol murder; I hold on to his sense of humor and his intelligence. I hold on to his stories and his past. I hold on to the jokes and the singing car rides. I hold on to the things that make me feel like a better person for just being around them.
*I stole that line from Alkaline Trio, don't quote me on it.
