In sickness and in health, till death do us part

There are nights I lie awake watching you sleep and I think to myself that my life is nothing without you. And with that thought, a deep sense of grief overwhelms me and I sob silently as you sleep. If there is one thing I have learnt these ten years together, it is not to take a single day for granted. All the joy and sorrow we have experienced have led me to understand that the only certainty in life is uncertainty.

So we celebrate our tenth wedding anniversary this 6 September, I ask myself what our ten years mean to me.  

Ten years is
... living with your chronic, progressive, painful inflammatory rheumatic disease and learning to cope with the sneaky attacks that give you excruciating pain and cripple your everyday life.

Ten years is
... having your parents live with us because I know your sense of responsibility is so strong that you cannot bear to have them live on their own.

Ten years is
... supporting you through your days as a postgraduate student and being so happy when you were conferred the doctoral title that people thought I was the one with the PhD!

Ten years is
... laughing at my stupid jokes every.single.time.

Ten years is
... being angry with people who belittle me and swearing to get even! 

Ten years is
... having complete faith in me and trusting my intuition about people.

Ten years is
... shopping with me at kate spade so often that all the sales people know you and greet you with a big smile!

Ten years is
... waking earlier than me on Sundays to cook so that I can have a delicious meal the minute I wake.

Ten years is
... queuing with me into the wee hours just because I had promised to get a Hello Kitty doll for a good friend.

Ten years is
... taking leave to accompany me on my PhD residentials twice a year and doing all the cooking and washing because you want me to focus on my studies.

Ten years is
...deciding to document my life in England even though photography is not your interest so that you can share the photos with my parents and they can have a glimpse of my life as a PhD student.

Ten years is
... making the effort to spend time with my parents and arrange dinner dates with my siblings.

Ten years is
... pretending not to see how fat I have grown and telling me ever so often that I'm smart and beautiful.

Ten years is
... crying with me when I shared about our infertility with church friends.

Ten years is
... supporting my decision not to attend church on Mother’s Day and Father’s Day because when our pastor asked all the mothers and fathers to stand, he makes me feel that we have the parts but not the goods and that cuts like a knife.

Ten years is
... going through the fertility treatment with me, learning to use needles and syringes and looking very sorry every time you give me an injection.

Ten years is
... agreeing to let me adopt a dog because you understand that our childlessness has left a big void in my heart.

Ten years is
... travelling for over an hour by bus and train from your work place to mine because you know that my work is a drag and seeing you after work is the highlight of my day.

Ten years is
... talking about our day face-to-face or via Skype every day for the last ten years because without that we cannot fall asleep.

Ten years is
... all the prayers, love and anger, hugs and kisses, laughter and tears, holding hands and heated quarrels, and more than words can say.

Ten years is you and me wrapped in happiness, joy and sorrow.
They are the best years of my life and I pray we have many, many more such blessed years together.

Happy anniversary, my dearest J! :) Every day, I thank God for you.

p.s. I love you to the moon and back.

37

I turned another year older a month back and wondered if my body clock is running out of time. There was a heightened sense of urgency and many a pensive thought.

J's present to me did cheer me up though. I'm carrying this tote on my trips to London and Lancaster this month. :) Love the words!

Things I have learnt at work

1) People here make a lot of personal calls. If we all had our own offices or rooms, I would not give a hoot about these calls. But. we. don’t. This office is, like many others, has an open concept. All of us (including the boss) are each assigned a cubicle whose partitions are not high. So everything you say or do is heard and viewed by everyone else. I do understand that some people need to check on their elderly parents/parents-in-law who are alone at home and others need to keep an eye on their young school-going children. But couldn’t they use their mobile phones and take the conversations outside? Seriously, do I really need to know that so-and-so’s parent has not eaten at 12 noon or that so-and-so’s son was traumatised because he had not learnt the words for his spelling and got an earful from his teacher? Even more ridiculous are the daily calls to the children’s teachers to check on their children’s well-being in school or to justify their children’s behaviour (usually misbehaviour). Sometimes, teachers really make the worst parents.

2) People love my food. I don’t mean the food I cook (I can’t cook to save my life!) but the food I eat. Whenever I have a meal in the pantry, someone is bound to come scrutinise my food and make one of the following exclamations, “Ooh! That smells so good!”, “Wow! You eat chilli?”, “What’s that you are eating? Nice?” It’s as if they have been deprived of food for eon and whatever I am eating is an oasis.

3) Conversation in the pantry stops immediately whenever I walk near the area. Apparently, people in this office cannot differentiate the sound of my footsteps from that of my boss. It amuses me no end when they find that it’s only me and resume their partying with relief. Actually, it’s terribly insulting for my boss. My shoes cost less than $50 while hers probably cost more than $500!

My cheap navy blue patent heels from Charles and Keith