What Makes Me Love Him?

Well folks, it's been 14 years of weddedness today. Can you believe it? Here's a song in honor of the day:

What makes me love him?
It's not his singing,
I've heard his singing,
It sours the milk
And yet, it's gotten to the point
Where I prefer that kind of milk.

What makes me love him?
It's not his learning.
He's learned so slowly,
His whole life long
And though he really knows
A multitude of things
They're mostly wrong.

He's not romantic,
And yet I love him.
No one occasion
He's used me ill
And though he's handsome
I know inside me
Were he a plain man
I'd love him still.

What makes me love him?
It's quite beyond me,
It must be something
I can't define.
Unless it's merely
That he's masculine
And that he's mine

Naw, all of it doesn't apply, but I think it's a funny song.

Here are the top 11 reasons why I love my Bruce, but in no particular order:

He tells people how great his wife if when I'm not around. (I've had many people that I'd not met before tell me so.)

He's a good father

He knows me better than anyone else, he's seen me at my absolute worst, and somehow he still seems to like me. Go figure!

He is very intelligent (though you wouldn't know it from his spelling)

He is level headed and even tempered.

We get along well together

He is very generous with his time, talents and resources

He doesn't mind it when I get act weird in public

He is very outgoing, and has brought me out of my shell quite a bit

He is just a good person all around

He can honestly answer the age old question: "Does this make me look fat?"

So if you are interested, here's the story of Bruce and Renae:

When I was in Jr High, I had a best friend named Jennifer. She was absolutely, totally, insanely, flipped out, crazy in love with some guy, from her youth group named Bruce. She would come to school all in an excited tither every Wednesday because that evening she would be seeing Bruce. I guess I'll have to blame the whole thing on her. She planted the image in my brain at such an early age that Bruce was a god.

Some weekend I spent the night with her, and I went to a youth group activity at Ziggy's - or was it Mr. Tee's - skating rink. I met the famous Bruce. I was 12, and he was 14. We couple skated, and I gave him my phone number. (Did Jennifer hate me? I don't know, she never said so, but probably a bit.) He was the first boy to ever call me on the phone. My dad freaked out, and yelled at him when he called. That was the end of it until...

We had an English class together in college. Having heard so much about "Bruce" for years, I of course knew who he was, and a goodly amount about him. However, we didn't interact with each other until...

My friend, Tally and I went to a carnival together. She said "Crystal's got a new boyfriend, he's doing a Tae Kwon Do demonstration here tonight. She wants me to go and meet them." So we went and met Crystal's new boyfriend, Bruce. Bruce said to me "Don't I know you from somewhere?" "Yes, I said, we have an English class together." We kind of dominated the conversation, as I recall it. He never called Crystal again. Next English class, he sat next to me, and we talked. My grade went from a solid A (I remember the teacher telling me that my papers were so good that there was no way I wouldn't make an easy A in her class.) to a C. I guess I got distracted.

We dated for at least a month before I told him that we had previously met, and that I'd heard many, many things about him. I didn't want him to think I was some kind of weirdo, still hung up on a guy that I met when I was 12.

He was not a member of the church. Problem stemming from said fact followed. Much controversy. Being young, stupid, and defiant, we eloped. He continued to live with his folks, and I with mine. We went on like this for 7 months, until I just couldn't take it anymore. We spilled the beans, my parents erupted, we moved in together. A couple of horrible years followed, we worked through it, decided that we liked each other after all, and that we'd try to make a go of it. Things settled down, we had two children, he joined the church, we had three more children (almost), and are as happy as can be.

For the record, I would definitely NOT advise taking this route to a happy marriage. 18 yrs old was just too young for me to get married, and there were lots of problems. I just happened to have actually picked a great guy, and worked hard to become happy -which I am now.

Okay, that was entirely too long. Sorry for the ramble.