To Chance

I am three days fashionably late. It was then, at the cottage that I hugged you and wished you a happy anniversary. I went on to tease you for my present knowing very well that we had not purchased each other gifts.

With your quick wit you promised that you were going to buy me a coffee. You know the way into my heart is less than two dollars. You did not let me off the hook and wondered what you would get in return. I promised you this.

“We are not the same persons this year as last; nor are those we love. It is a happy chance if we, changing, continue to love a changed person.”
– William Somerset Maugham

You are but a hint of the twenty three year old boy that I boldly walked up to and introduced myself to fifteen years ago. I still hear it in your laughter. I catch it in your bright smile and that mischievous spark in your eye.

You are barely the same man that I joined at the end of the aisle when I wore the white dress and made big promises to only six years ago.

It’s hard to say if it was marriage or having children that changed our relationship because we waited nine years before either. The thing that surprises me most is that I am still discovering you.

The happy chance is that six years ago there was one girl professing her love to you and now there are three.