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| Cornell's hilltop campus from Cayuga Lake |
That date was twenty years ago, what seems like a lifetime, and nearly half of my life ago. That day, unbeknownst to me, I would take a step that I was very nervous to take, and it would change the course of my life. Or maybe, I would continue on the life I was destined to live. When I look back on that day, and I picture myself wearing my favorite broken in jeans, suede loafers, brown long sleeve shirt, walking with one of my roommates that I hardly knew into a crowded parking lot full of other first year graduate students, I actually see this memory as going from black and white, to one of vivid colors as the night, days, weeks, years and decades pass.
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| May 15, 2013 |
I decided to go to grad school halfway through my senior year at Mizzou. I was lucky enough to have a great job in an Entomology lab, working as a lab assistant to a grad student. I loved the research and the work and realized how much there was to know about plants. I wanted to learn more, I craved it. Flash forward 9 months and I am living in a house with three other grad students in Ithaca, NY, getting ready to start a Master's research assistantship. Cornell University organized a bunch of activities the weeks before school to get first year grad students out and mingled with friends and cohorts before the rigors of school started. The joke was that once it started, you would never see another soul, buried in the library, lab, greenhouse or office working diligently on research and coursework. The first of these activities was a mixer where students from all departments gathered and were offered different types of nights on the town with more senior grad students as your guides, someone with grad school experience to tell you the real deal, warn you of pitfalls and introduce you to all the greatness Ithaca had to offer. There were fancy options, dancing options, drinking options, partying options, I ended up choosing one of the laid-back options, hand tossed pizza at The Nines followed by beer at the Chapter House, one of the favorite grad student watering holes.
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| The Blond in a different green shirt |
Earlier, when I had walked up to the parking lot where the meeting was taking place, I remember looking around at everyone there. I was already pretty self conscience about being at an Ivy League school. I was never a super strong student, B or B+, but I was a hard worker, inquisitive and just dumb enough to not realize what I was getting myself into. Going from the Midwest to upstate NY was quite a change, the people were pretty different and I was scoping the crowd for what seemed like a familiar, or at least comforting face. I found one, actually I found a few. One was this blond guy with glasses, wearing Quicksilver jeans, Dr. Martens and a long sleeved dark green shirt. He was cute, but I wasn't there to meet boys. The next two faces I found that were cheerful and inviting were two women of color, group leaders and obvious best friends laughing away and really enjoying the moment. I went and joined their group for pizza and beer. And then, so did the blond.
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| baby Willow and her accomplice Curly, planning their escape |
I could go on about that night, about his California surfing stories, the fact that my mantra for the last 6 months (These are Days by 10,000 Maniacs) was playing in his car that night when he drove me home. I could tell you more about our courting, stories from grad school, our first apartment together and our first kid, Curly-Fries Godzuki Dean aka Best Dog Ever. How he spent hours reading his government tomes by the supplemental light of my greenhouse experiments while I collected thousands of data points. How he proposed to me while canoeing on Cayuga Lake. Twenty years together makes for a lot of stories, many good, a few sad, some forgotten, some worth retelling over and over. But what 20 years together does without you knowing, is it gives you such a deep and intimate knowledge of who you are and who this other person is that you have travelled this distance beside. You find levels of love and admiration you didn't know existed. You see this person as human, faults and all, and you love them deeper for it. This person sees you at your best and also your worst, in places you never thought you would fall to and definitely wouldn't want another soul to witness. You live your lives together, with not only common goals, but with personal goals of how to help that person become the best they can be. You feel love and joy that you didn't realize were possible, you achieve heights and dreams that you never had the courage, on your own, to create. Doing this creates a special bond, a special love that is really impossible to describe, unless, of course you, too, are lucky enough to have been there.
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| The early days.....ages 9m and 2 |
I often think of what advice I would give our kids when they are looking for a life partner and honestly, other than "choose wisely" I'm not sure what I would say. Sometimes I thank my lucky stars that I did choose wisely and other days, I don't think I really made the choice at all. Some days, I feel we were thrown together that night on purpose and all steps to that meeting were predestined as was every step after. When it's right, it's right and I think part of you knows. At least that is how it was for me. I am just so glad I listened to that part of me, the part that knew Timothy and I could create a beautiful life together, with just enough hardship to keep us grounded and real, and more than enough love to share with the two beautiful souls we have been blessed to guide through childhood. With enough respect, admiration and support to start a very successful business that has afforded us an easy lifestyle, vacations and given me the opportunity to pay witness to our children as they grow and change day in and day out. With enough risk, chaos and crazy to move to the country to become farmers, raise goats and fuel my passion for fiber arts, supporting a dream that I was almost too scared to even let enter my mind. Together, we have done a lot, a lifetime of things, and the best part is, we have only just started. God-willing we will have many more decades side by side, loving, supporting, respecting and admiring each other. And frankly, my mind wants to explode at the possibilities of where we might be in 2033. So, for all those interested, stay tuned......
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| Building stuff with the boy, circa 2010 |
Timothy Patrick McLarney, there are no words I could say or ways I could even show you how much you mean to me and how happy I am to be walking this crazy path with you. Thank you for loving me, supporting me, listening to me and holding my hand. Here's to the next 20!
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| Dr. Farm Hand shearing Hercules |
