All the ways my life WOULD BE WORSE

I love my husband. I mean, I really love my husband. My kids make fun of us sometimes, because we do tend to bicker a little bit after the time-honored tradition of long-married couples, and lets face it, he flat-out drives me crazy sometimes, but when all is said and done, I love him deeply, passionately, truly in a way I never could have imagined 33 years ago when I married him or 38 years ago when he pushed me in a swimming pool and changed my life forever.

A few months ago, a dear friend of ours lost her husband. Tom & I go to visit her from time to time & she is courageous, funny, stiff-upper lipped, and lonely. I guess that's why I've been reflecting on all the ways my life would be worse without Tom & here they are:

1. I would have to change my own lightbulbs and frankly, after not doing it for 33 years, I don't even really remember how--especially track lights & chandelier bulbs. I'm afraid of heights & lots of our lightbulbs require ladders to change.
2. Who am I kidding? I would have to move. I COULD NOT trim my own trees, weed my own garden (allergic & uninterested--not just lazy), fix my own water heater, paint my own walls, make the cable TV work, remodel my own kitchen, scrub the burned-on grease off my own pots, handle my own plumbing needs (can barely plunge a toilet--anything harder than that, MUST GET TOM). And lets just face the facts, if I didn't have Tom, my kitchen would probably never be truly clean again. Whenever I clean anything, he comes in behind me and quietly re-cleans, so that nobody has to call the health inspectors.
3. Okay, how to say this delicately & tastefully? He totally & completely floats my boat. Still. More & better than ever (sorry, kids). If he were gone, I doubt that my boat would ever get floated again. I'm a big fan of boats.
4. I would have to hike by myself. And probably get eaten by a mountain lion.
5. Who would fix my car? Or change my oil? Or my window-washer fluid?
6. AAAGGHH!! Think of all the people I'd have to hire: Auto mechanics, house painters, gardeners, handymen, accountants, plumbers, electricians! Being married to Tom has saved me thousands, if not hundreds of thousands of dollars. Because Tom can fix, remodel, paint & build, we have always lived in a much nicer house than we can actually afford.
7. If I had a horrible day, who would I tell? If I had a great day, who would I tell?
8. If it weren't for Tom, my subversive, irreverant thought process would run amok. I know this actually sounds kind of awesome, but really, from time-to-time his mild disapproval of my political/religious/social incorrectness is all that stands between me and total ostracism by the human race.
9. Wow, it would be easy to go inactive in the church, if I didn't know how important it was to him. Because, although I love the church, I DO NOT love meetings. Tom makes me go. And almost always, I'm glad I did.
10. Getting old is perfectly acceptable to me, because I am getting old with him. I love to travel with him, go to movies & the theater with him, read & discuss books with him, go hiking with him. Even though I would still love doing all that stuff if he weren't here, it wouldn't be the same.
11. Who would I look to as such a perfect example of Christlike service?
12. Who would give me priesthood blessings?
13. Who would tell me that I am beautiful? You'd be surprised by how many people forget to mention it.

And here are all the ways my life would be better without Tom:

1. There would be less laundry.

I LOVE HIM!!!! 33 years this month! He still knocks my socks off and has a really cute rear-end.

Happy anniversary to us!