11 years

When Packrat asked me to marry him, I told him that I wanted to get married on Easter Sunday on the 4th of April. I didn't specify the year. I just wanted it to be Easter and it had to be the 4th of April. Of course, that didn't happen. Primarily because my mother pointed out that no church would marry us on an Easter Sunday, whatever the date was, however important the date was to us. And also, when I realised that the next Easter that would be April 4th was going to be in 2010 (this was in 2002), I decided there was no way I was waiting 8 years before we got married!

And it's not just because I'm neurotic and crazy. There really is a reason to the craziness. Packrat asked me on the 4th of April 1999, which was incidentally Easter Sunday to be his girlfriend. And what led to it was a Ball on Good Friday where friends signed us up to be King and Queen of the Ball and we had to eat an apple off a string and kiss for a whole minute.

Packrat was really into the kissing because he liked me. I thought it was funny and spent much time laughing. Apparently, that confused the boy. I agreed to let him kiss me but I laughed so what was I actually saying to him? Anyway, the rest is history and it is history that I very much like and am extremely nostalgic about.



















When I was looking for the photographs that immortalized the day, I found so many others of our time in Melbourne, with little notes faithfully recorded to remind me of our youth, our joy and the fun we had. The Melbourne album ended with the trip we made back for our engagement. And thinking back to those days when things were simpler and our faces weren't lined with worries and stresses about jobs, money and more recently our children, I sigh. Partially out of contentment but partially out of wistfulness that those were days we would never be able to revisit.

















This is one of my favourite photographs from our engagement trip. And when I look at it, I yearn for such alone time with Packrat and such peace. But at the same time, my life, while frenzied, uber-stressful and exhausting does have a great amount of joy and love I never thought I could feel. You see, then, our lives were just us. We didn't think much about anyone else, we didn't understand a lot of what was ahead of us and we rolled our eyes at married couples and more so at those with children. We still do some of the time, but in the eleven years, we've become a married couple, with kids to boot and while I do at times hate my life and whinge and mourn for the old days of freedom, it's amazing how far Packrat and I have come in this time.

I think we had foresight too. Because on our wedding day programme, we had this verse.

Marriage hath in it less of beauty but more of safety, than the single life; it hath more care, but less danger, it is more merry, and more sad; it is fuller of sorrows, and fuller of joys; it lies under more burdens, but it is supported by all the strengths of love and charity, and those burdens are delightful.

Bishop Jeremy Taylor

And 'tis true. Every single word of it. But today, to commemorate the first Easter 4th in eleven years, hopefully, we get to just be us, be silly and just be together.

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