It's my ten year anniversary!

I love how I'm announcing my anniversary, but I'm excited.  Ten years is over a third of my life.  Ten years ago we could play music in the airport; Michael Jackson was still alive and I DIDN'T HAVE STRETCH MARKS!  So, I'm glad my marriage is doing good, we've been through some very hard times and are still here to tell the tale!

So, as a fun memory, I thought I'd post an excerpt from my journal--the book that will be published at the end of this year.  I'm hoping to have it out by Zeke's birthday (Nov. 18th) as a birthday present.

If you're wondering who Zeke is, then check out these links:

• Zeke Strength of God
• My Son Is In Heaven

Do you remember when I wrote: Everyone Has A Story?
Well, that girl opened my eyes so much, that I started going to the mountains by myself at least once a week.  I loved it up there.  It was beautiful and peaceful, the perfect place to be alone.  But after I met Cade, everything changed.

Keep in mind that I was nineteen when I wrote this; it's not hard seeing how young I was.  Zeke was alive and we'd just visited him in the hospital.  

Here's that excerpt:

I still can't sleep, so I'm in the kitchen writing for awhile.  I hope Cade is doing okay.  You wouldn't believe how tired he looks; he even has black circles under his eyes.  Before I gave birth to Zeke, Cade had a hard time breathing.  He breathed into a brown paper sack.  There I was, the one in labor and Cade kept playing with that crazy brown bag testing how many times he could blow the damn thing up.  That guy makes me smile, even in the hardest times.  When he held me tonight I remembered how I fell in love with him.
  The night I met Cade he wore a big, black, biker jacket.  His hair hung long past his shoulders and he was as sexy as Hell, really he was.  He didn't say a lot, but didn't have to.  I just hoped I was destined to meet him.  He leaned next to an old, beat-up car and smoked into the wind.  He didn't care he breathed in his own second-hand smoke.  I don't know why, but I thought that was cool.  It was twice as dangerous and really edgy.  We talked for awhile that night and I guess when he went home he wrote a song on his guitar and the song was for me. 
         I dropped by his apartment at five in the morning the next day, just for the Hell of it.  I guess Cade was sleeping on the couch when I stopped by.  He'd stayed up all night playing the guitar and fallen asleep right there in the front room.  
         When he answered the door I looked at him and thought how gorgeous he was in the morning.  His eyes were big and bright and he seemed excited to see me.  I told him to grab his guitar since he'd told me he played.  I drove to a coffee shop, then headed straight for the mountains.  We sped along a super windy road.  I loved moving fast and Cade almost spilled his coffee a couple of times.  
         I pulled off at a nice looking place and we hiked up the side of the mountain together.  At one point we ran into a huge stream.  Cade insisted he could find a way to cross and I jumped in.  That water was Hell of cold, but just my style.  I didn't care how wet I got or anything because it sounded like fun and I wasn't born with patience anyway.  I made it to the other side pretty fast and told Cade to jump in, but he looked at me fondly and stifled a grin.  He walked up and down the bank and said he'd be right back.  After a few minutes he showed up next to me on my side of the bank.  I was soaking wet in the cold and he appeared as dry as the sun.  I laughed about it and told him he was missing out.  After all, there's nothing like cold water to wake you up in the morning.  
         “That's what the coffee was for,” Cade said and I smiled.  I'd never met anyone like him in my life.
           I packed my violin the whole time and itched to play it.  I always get like that when I'm in the mountains.  Nature and music go hand in hand, practically.
          I went up first and Cade followed me.  We traversed a steep part once; I caught him staring at my butt and I raised a brow.  His face turned a little red and I grinned really big when I moved back up the mountain.  I even swayed my hips while we went, just in case he looked.  After awhile we made it to this nice, flat spot.  I sat down without saying a word and played my violin.  Cade's jaw dropped and I thought I might have to screw the thing back in place or something.  I pulled out all the stops for the guy.  We played a couple of songs together.  I was impressed with his skills and that says a lot because I've played with a ton of musicians.  
          He showed me a song he wrote.  When the chords swam around us, I heard a crazy-beautiful melody in my head.  I played it because I couldn't help being a conduit or something.  Then Cade sang with his solid voice, and chills flew up my spine as something awakened inside me.  No one had ever made me feel like that.  He sang the same melody I played—note for note.  I stood because the music poured from me.  At that moment I probably couldn't have told you where I was.  I was the music, no kidding.
          We continued like that for awhile, playing the same choruses and melodies like we'd performed together since birth.  When we finished we just sat silently and looked at each other.  It was one of the weirdest moments in my entire life, not that I've lived that long, but still.  I had goose bumps running over my arms and they weren't because I was soaking wet.  That was when I knew I'd met the man I would spend the rest of my life with.  The man with the golden voice, the patience I'd always lacked and the most striking eyes I'd ever seen.  He was my future.  We got married three weeks later.