As time goes by...

It was 10 years ago tonight that Zach took me by the hand and asked me to be his girlfriend. If it sounds kinda "high school," well, it's b/c it was. We were seniors, at a party at our friend Mike's house after the last football game of the season. Zach was on the football team, I was on the drill/dance team. I'd had a crush on him for months, having met and begun spending time with him through Lindsey, one of my best friends at the time (and who would eventually become my step-sister... in an interesting coincidence my mom and her dad started dating at about the same time Zach and I did, married the following April, will soon celebrate their own 10 yr anniversary). A few weeks before we'd kissed, an event that shocked all our friends but most of all ourselves. The next day, though, he said it was too fast, and wanted to "just be friends." It took him those 3 weeks to figure out that he obviously couldn't live without me. ; )

The picture was taken in February 1998, just a few months after we started dating, the night of the Valentine's Day Formal, at my mom's house (the cat, below, is Joker, long-lost brother to Jester who still resides with my mom).

In January we'll be married 4 years. To celebrate these 2 anniversaries combined, we'll be going to Lyon for a long weekend next month. And then, in February. a baby. Our son. It's amazing all we've gone through in the past 10 years, the people we used to be, who we've become, who we've helped each other grow to be. And then there's all the years yet ahead-- I wonder the joys and trials they will bring, as I'm sure there will be plenty of each. I wonder what we'll be like, what our children will be like, what life has in store for us all. We'll find out, eventually. Together.