A Gratitude Bouquet for my Husband

 

kissShort and sweet, dear Ricochet friends.

Having read your essays this past month as they revealed lives of courage, hardship, mind-boggling talent, empathy, humor and love – well – I’m grateful – and humbled.

So let me be brief. My husband saved my life. My gratitude for his love and support has bloomed beyond my imaginings as the years have passed. We were young and from very different family cultures. As the second of seven children beneath a very brilliant and driven older sister — I was rather lost, directionless and drifting, I shared an apartment with her and my kid brother during my second year of college. On a Saturday afternoon my big sister took me on a tour of the med school anatomy lab. My future husband and I met over a cadaver. Love at first sight.

His father was a Baptist minister who fought our marriage. He told me that my husband knew better than to marry a Catholic. We married, anyway. It wasn’t always smooth-going, but we struggled and grew together like the trees you’ve seen whose trunks and branches become indistinguishable, one from the other, over the years. We raised our son (yep — I gifted him with a Ricochet membership) who has made us so proud as we’ve watched him help tease apart a few of the mysteries of the solar system.

My husband’s support of our little family and my broader wonderful family at large, created a life that I’d never dreamed possible. The family sharings and laughter throughout the years rest on the bedrock of his sacrifice and hard work.

He’s made it possible for me to indulge my love of wandering through the natural world and to procure the series of cameras ( film and processing were required back then!) and the leisure hours to record the beauty around me.

There’s so much that fills my heart as I look across the room and watch him cheering his OSU football team.

Yes, he played the tuba in The Ohio State Marching Band. (That’s really the reason I married him.)

I brag on him all the time. And thank him every day for my good life.

I am grateful.

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  1. Curt North Inactive
    Curt North
    @CurtNorth

    Trink: He’s just sore about that last call.

    It was a bad spot, you know it, I know it, the whole world knows it.

    • #31
  2. GLDIII Reagan
    GLDIII
    @GLDIII

    Trink,

    Seems a small world that my orbit has crossed, but not collided, with not one but two astronomers who reside here on Ricochet (Tim H. is the other one). I’ll keep my eye out for your NHU boy….Looks like I have worked on a few of his “sensors” based on his home page.

    III

    • #32
  3. Trink Coolidge
    Trink
    @Trink

    GLDIII: Looks like I have worked on a few of his “sensors” based on his home page.

    No Waaaaay!   Awesome !

    • #33
  4. Western Chauvinist Member
    Western Chauvinist
    @WesternChauvinist

    Curt North:

    Trink: He’s just sore about that last call.

    It was a bad spot, you know it, I know it, the whole world knows it.

    Don’t. Stop. Don’t..Stop. Don’t stop…. I’m already drunk on the tears of the Left. I’ll have to check-in at Betty Ford if Michigan fans keep up the boo-hooing.

    • #34
  5. RightAngles Member
    RightAngles
    @RightAngles

    That was really lovely, Trink.

    • #35
  6. doulalady Member
    doulalady
    @doulalady

    Well, that was sweet Trink.

    • #36
  7. Vectorman Inactive
    Vectorman
    @Vectorman

    thekd45:

    Vectorman:<Nerd mode on>

    He was technically a Sousaphone player:

    ohio-band

    <Nerd mode off>

    Congratulations from another Big 10 (Illinois) Marching Band Tuba Sousaphone player.

    In the big band, we were both; sousaphone to band directors, and “tuba” to all the coed groupies that we big-horn players always had around us.

    Yes, we did the same thing! I had to wait for my wife (my groupie from college too!) to find my original shirt (front/back):

    102_1194102_1195

    • #37
  8. Midget Faded Rattlesnake Member
    Midget Faded Rattlesnake
    @Midge

    Vectorman:<Nerd mode on>

    He was technically a Sousaphone player:

    ohio-band

    <Nerd mode off>

    Congratulations from another Big 10 (Illinois) Marching Band Tuba Sousaphone player.

    Even nerdier mode on… ;-P

    Lovely piece, Trink! I am grateful for my husband, too. Sometimes I’m not the chipperest sort, and that can be a little hard on him. But I am always grateful.

    • #38
  9. RightAngles Member
    RightAngles
    @RightAngles

    Vectorman:<Nerd mode on>

    He was technically a Sousaphone player:

    ohio-band

    <Nerd mode off>

    Congratulations from another Big 10 (Illinois) Marching Band Tuba Sousaphone player.

    My grandfather played the Sousaphone!

    • #39
  10. Percival Thatcher
    Percival
    @Percival

    Vectorman:<Nerd mode on>

    He was technically a Sousaphone player:

    ohio-band

    <Nerd mode off>

    Congratulations from another Big 10 (Illinois) Marching Band Tuba Sousaphone player.

    Oh, pish. I was a Marching Illini sousaphone player, but when we played in the Harding Building, we played tubas.

     

    • #40
  11. RightAngles Member
    RightAngles
    @RightAngles

    Percival:

    Vectorman:<Nerd mode on>

    He was technically a Sousaphone player:

    ohio-band

    <Nerd mode off>

    Congratulations from another Big 10 (Illinois) Marching Band Tuba Sousaphone player.

    Oh, pish. I was a Marching Illini sousaphone player, but when we played in the Harding Building, we played tubas.

    My grandfather played the Sousaphone in John Philip Sousa’s band, and Sousa wrote a solo for him. After that he played bassoon in the Houston Symphony Orchestra. Or was it the tuba.

    • #41
  12. Western Chauvinist Member
    Western Chauvinist
    @WesternChauvinist

    RightAngles:

    Percival:

    Vectorman:<Nerd mode on>

    He was technically a Sousaphone player:

    ohio-band

    <Nerd mode off>

    Congratulations from another Big 10 (Illinois) Marching Band Tuba Sousaphone player.

    Oh, pish. I was a Marching Illini sousaphone player, but when we played in the Harding Building, we played tubas.

    My grandfather played the Sousaphone in John Philip Sousa’s band, and Sousa wrote a solo for him. After that he played bassoon in the Houston Symphony Orchestra. Or was it the tuba.

    Yes, but did he ever dot the “i”???

    • #42
  13. Midget Faded Rattlesnake Member
    Midget Faded Rattlesnake
    @Midge

    Funny moment at Chez Rattler:

    Mr R: Well, I brought home the bacon and started the fire.
    Mrs R: And I burned the bacon on the fire!

    • #43
  14. Trink Coolidge
    Trink
    @Trink

    RightAngles: My grandfather played the Sousaphone in John Philip Sousa’s band, and Sousa wrote a solo for him. After that he played bassoon in the Houston Symphony Orchestra. Or was it the tuba.

    No waaaay!!!!!

    • #44
  15. Vectorman Inactive
    Vectorman
    @Vectorman

    RightAngles:

    Percival:

    Vectorman:<Nerd mode on>

    He was technically a Sousaphone player:

    ohio-band

    <Nerd mode off>

    Congratulations from another Big 10 (Illinois) Marching Band Tuba Sousaphone player.

    Oh, pish. I was a Marching Illini sousaphone player, but when we played in the Harding Building, we played tubas.

    My grandfather played the Sousaphone in John Philip Sousa’s band, and Sousa wrote a solo for him. After that he played bassoon in the Houston Symphony Orchestra. Or was it the tuba.

    @Percival and @rightangles,

    I checked on Google Earth and the Harding Building is still there. It holds the Sousa Archives and Center for American Music.

    Freaky!

    • #45
  16. Percival Thatcher
    Percival
    @Percival

    Vectorman:

    RightAngles:

    Percival:

    Vectorman:<Nerd mode on>

    He was technically a Sousaphone player:

    ohio-band

    <Nerd mode off>

    Congratulations from another Big 10 (Illinois) Marching Band Tuba Sousaphone player.

    Oh, pish. I was a Marching Illini sousaphone player, but when we played in the Harding Building, we played tubas.

    My grandfather played the Sousaphone in John Philip Sousa’s band, and Sousa wrote a solo for him. After that he played bassoon in the Houston Symphony Orchestra. Or was it the tuba.

    @Percival and @rightangles,

    I checked on Google Earth and the Harding Building is still there. It holds the Sousa Archives and Center for American Music.

    Freaky!

    I looked for the Sousaphone shed (where we kept the practice instruments) but I can’t find it. Probably got pulled down when they messed with the South Quad. The Carillon (is that what they call it?) is in the center of our practice field.

    • #46
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