Rob & Kelly came to be 12 years ago. We've been a couple for a dozen years. That's a whole egg carton of years.

Twelve years ago I was 14. Rob was a year ahead of me in school and was already driving. He had longish hair and played in a heavy metal band. (No, really.) Why my parents allowed me to date him is beyond me, especially since the rule was that I couldn't date until I was 16. (And they sure as hell hadn't budged on the Can't Pierce Your Ears Until You're 12 rule). But it might have had something to do with my relentless begging and pleading, not to mention my sincere insistence that not being allowed to date this boy would, like, totally ruin my life. (For the record, it very well might have. I'm just saying.)

He asked me out on March 31, and at some point during the next week he told me that he'd chosen the 31st because not every month has one, and so he wouldn't have to remember as many anniversaries. I'm pretty sure he was joking. Maybe.

Little did he know we'd last long enough to start counting anniversaries in years instead of months. Little did he know someday he'd have our wedding anniversaries to remember. But I knew. The things I deeply believed in at 14 I no longer hold to be true. Except for Rob. He's the one thing I was right about.

And for the record, he's never forgotten an anniversary.

• Is it bad to go to the retirement party of a person in your office building whom you don't know just so you can snag some cake? Really bad if you then congratulate him as if you know him, surely causing him fears of senility?




• Vanilla cola flavored lip gloss serves the exact opposite purpose for which it's intended because of all the lip-licking it induces. One's lips are persistently chapped despite/because of the stuff. But on the bright side - mmmm, they taste like vanilla cola!




• When a man in a cowboy hat offers you a toothpick, take it. It's his way of being chivalrous. Never mind that you won't need it with your tuna salad sandwich.




• Allergies are to spring like blisters to new shoes - bothersome side effects, but so totally worth it.

There's nothing sexier...

Since the beginning of the year (excluding the few days when our dishwasher was broken), I've been making an effort to keep the kitchen counters and sink clear of dishes. It sounds so simple, but we're lazy and so it's not. But I hate coming home to a cluttered kitchen, and I really hate trying to make dinner around stacks of skillets and piles of crusty silverware, so I decided that I was going to start acting like a mature adult and keep the kitchen clean.

Now, whenever I finish using a plate or glass or spoon I immediately put it in the dishwasher. Because would you believe? There is a space in our kitchen to keep dirty dishes! Until they're ready to wash! Brilliant. I also have a wire rack in the right-side sink that I put dirty non-dishwasher items in. The rule is that when it's full, I wash the items rather than allowing the stack to spill onto the counters. So simple, like I said.

Except. My darling (supposedly brilliant) husband cannot re-train himself. And it is, quite frankly, driving me bonkers. Let's say Rob eats a snack. Afterwards he will take his dirty snack plate to the kitchen, rinse it under the faucet, and then set it on the clean counter. The counter that is directly above the dishwasher. The counter that is not more than THREE INCHES from the top of the dishwasher door. And if he's the one who clears the dinner table, he'll take the plates, rinse them, and then leave them in the sink to "soak." Dinner plates don't need to soak! They don't really even need rinsed! He could totally use that effort to put them in the dishwasher. I'm just saying.

And the thing is, he's very appreciative of our now-neat kitchen. He's complimented me repeatedly on my efforts, told me multiple times that the kitchen looks great. And yet?! He still leaves his cereal bowl sitting next to the sink! It's incomprehensible.

I'll watch him do it, and then I'll say, "See, this is an example of when you could put the bowl in the dishwasher." (A mere three inches away!) At first I thought he just needed reminding, so I was patient. You know, for the first two months. But now I'm getting pissed off.

Yesterday I slid my dinner dishes into the dishwasher and had just finished wiping the counters when Rob came over and plopped his plate on the (pristine) counter and started to walk away. "Are you kidding me?" I accosted him. "Seriously, how hard is it?" (Three inches!)

He stammered a bit before finally formulating his excuse: "I just think it's more efficient to stack everything and then come back later and load them all into the dishwasher, rather than doing it one at a time."

Well of course it's more efficient. For him. Because I'm the one who later comes along and puts them away!

So, I wonder which is more efficient...smacking him upside the head with my hand or with a dish towel?

"The great lesson . . . [is] that the sacred is in the ordinary, that it is to be found in one’s daily life, in one’s neighbors, friends, and family, in one’s back yard..."

About now a year ago we were in Puerto Rico, where we spent some time before catching a Caribbean cruise. We explored San Juan, a place I found to be quite charming. Our hotel was located in Old San Juan which is the quaint, historic part of the city. Winding cobblestone streets, 17th century Spanish architecture, forts with an imposing presence, and an old stone wall that still surrounds much of the city are the trademarks of Old San Juan.

What I liked the most about Old San Juan was its many juxtapositions - the colorful houses that began as soon as the drab gray wall of the fort ended, modern architecture mixed with old, and a language that wasn't so much a juxtaposition as a harmonious coexistence of Spanish and English. In front of the San Cristóbal fort is a large field and as we approached we saw that it was filled with people flying kites. To see the kites dancing gracefully in the air above a stalwart stone fort...that was Old San Juan.

Our first night in Puerto Rico we took a kayaking tour in a bioluminescent bay. This remains one of my favorite experiences - not just of the trip, but of all time ever. The tour took us into the bay at night. We hopped into two-person kayaks and made our way silently down a narrow tree-canopy-covered creek that led to the bay. As we got closer, we began to notice faint bioluminescence in the water. Wherever the water was stirred, the micro-organisms reacted to the disturbance by glowing. As I dipped my paddle in, there was a bluish glow, and as I pulled it through the water, a glowing trail followed my paddle's path. This was but a hint of the magic we were about to encounter.

In the bay itself, the entire body of water seemed to faintly glow blue, and a bright blue emerged with every swish. The dart of a fish looked like a shooting star. I leaned over the side of the kayak and wrote my name in the water with my finger - the letters lingered for a moment, as if written in blue ink, before fading away.

We slipped out of the kayak to swim. I laid back, floating, and moved my arms and legs across the water. "Look, Rob," I said. A glowing snow angel.

And when we cupped our hands underwater and then pulled them above the surface, the water we'd contained sparkled as it slid down and around our hands. Each droplet was a white-blue gleam, liquid diamonds that twinkled as they trickled one by one through my fingers.