Oh, he came through all right...

You must understand something about my Mike. He's not an overly demonstrative man. By that I mean that he is "tastefully understated" as far as mushy cards, overkill on PDA, massive gifting sort of things go. Don't get me wrong - he's very affectionate and knows how to subtly convey that. His cards are to the point and lets the card convey the message. He's an avid hand holder. And through the years, I've learned to read the nuances of his expressions so well that, were I a poker player, I could beat him just by reading his expressions. So when he does "grand gestures", he REALLY does GRAND gestures!

The Christmas after we moved back to the States, I didn't expect anything seeing as how we had bought 2 cars, built a GORGEOUS house, had to get a full complement of appliances - all those "hemorrhaging money" things one must do after living overseas for an extended period and setting up house in the US of A once again. So the last thing I expected was what I got. First I opened the well-hidden tell-tale robin egg blue box tied with a white ribbon bow to find a GORGEOUS Tiffany diamond ring. Then I opened the card and started crying. Jennifer, knowing Mike's brevity, said, "Did he WRITE in it this time??" Oh, he had!

Well, imagine my surprise when I get a call yesterday from an unknown number who identified himself as a floral deliveryman who had just left a delivery on my front porch and wanted to make sure I was going to be coming home soon. I was 5 minutes away so sped back to find this waiting by my door:


It is HUGE and GORGEOUS and all that good stuff. You have to click on the photo to truly appreciate how beautiful they are! When I call him to thank him, he then tells me that he needs to get a local florist to call because he REALLY wanted to get a bouquet of 32 roses, one for each year, but wasn't able to figure out how to do that online (remember, he's in Alaska right now) so I "only got" (his words) 24 roses. Sucker punch to the heart...wow...

You're a good man, Charlie Brown. Thank you. And I love you.