Tom and I spooned on the couch watching television, relaxed, content. I was pregnant with Tommy. "When we have the baby, will we still cuddle like this?"
I don't remember Tom's answer, but I do know that having children made any kind of relaxing difficult for years, much less any cuddling...unless having one to three kids, and sometimes a Siamese cat, squirming between you counts as cuddling. And it's not just children that can come between you, demanding lots of time and attention, but also jobs, pets, housework, or in our case, housebuilding.
But the babies are almost grown now, and we're getting very good at ignoring things that "need to be done," making it possible for us to take off all by ourselves every once in a while like we did yesterday morning, exploring the countryside in the Suzuki Samurai (after stopping at Sonic for drinks.)
The road we drove down yesterday isn't far from us - I've passed it millions of times, wondering where it would take me but never turning to find out. Now instead of wondering, I'll know and remember I was with Tom on our anniversary when I first discovered the beautiful Texas landscape it winds through. It follows a creek, criss-crossing back and forth on low, concrete bridges through ranchland, and in places runs under towering cliffs, some over sixty feet tall. The "creek" is mostly just a limestone bed right now, dotted with a few pools of water where herons have an easy time snacking on captive fish. But clumps of debris caught halfway up nearby oaks warns that at times it is a torrent.
We passed a field of Black-Eyed Susans, budding cactuses, weathered ranchhouses with sheet metal roofs, and gated manors hidden behind stone walls. Ancient oaks somehow still outnumbered junipers.
Real life still interfered for part of the day - shuttling Kendall to band practice, spending a few hours at work, Tom taking care of his chores around the house - but we managed a few minutes snuggling in the hammock, took off by ourselves again in the afternoon and had dinner at the Pier (a local lakeside restaurant), making it home in time to watch the sunset from our back deck.
Just the two of us, for a little while at least.
