Long Ago
Dinka and I spent over an hour last night looking through pictures from when we were dating/newly married, just like the one above. We stumbled upon them when looking through some other pictures and after the first few, we were hooked on the memories and couldn't stop. I was surprised to see that I once had a few defined muscles (although minuscule) atop my bony frame; Dinka admired her pre-motherhood figure and remembered that she once wore a bikini. We both concluded that we were quite attractive as a young couple and should have appreciated it while it lasted.
I also noticed that my face seems to have changed a bit since then, matured somehow, which is kind of a new thing to me. When I was growing up, it didn't seem unusual for my face to change because the rest of my body was still changing as well, but when I stopped growing I kind of expected everything else to come to a halt. It's hard to tell when this change occurred or what happened exactly, but it's definitely there. Is it in my eyes, my cheeks, my hair? Did it happen when I was twenty-one, twenty-two? It is impossible to quantify these things but they are no less there because of it.
Four years have passed since that picture was taken and, as always, it feels alternately like much more and much less. The enormity of what has taken place over that period of time makes it impossible to sort out neatly. When each year seems like a whole new world, how are you supposed to fit everything on a timeline? The one thing that always comes to mind when I get caught up in these thoughts and memories is that I wouldn't take a day of it back (save a few in high school, maybe). It has all been exactly right and it just keeps on getting better, which I think is about all you can hope for. Although we're losing our looks, we are happy and fulfilled like we never could have expected.
Even when you don't set out to write a post of Thanksgiving, you get one anyway. Ah well, it's best not to fight it I suppose.