THE LUCKIEST

About seven years ago I went to a party thrown by some friends in Salt Lake City. I was in town for a family reunion, but was able to get away for just one night.

The event was populated with some pretty fabulous looking women, but one caught my eye across the living room. In a very uncharacteristic move, I walked up to her and introduced myself.

We spoke for… well… I don’t know how long. It felt like just a few minutes, but it was about an hour, I think. During the course of the conversation, I learned that this woman was highly educated, successful, crazy smart, funny, and, indeed, a stone cold fox. I thought to ask why such an accomplished woman would even talk to an unemployed beach bum like me, but I held my tongue. In another first, I asked for her phone number. I walked away from the party reasonably confident I would marry this person I just met.

What followed for the next year was a long distance romance that closely resembled the plot of those horrible romantic comedies I hate so much. Eventually, Julie moved to LA, and we were married about a year later.

Those events have created such a seismic shift in my life that I don’t have the capacity to really express it. Put simply, it opened the floodgates of happiness in my life, and I have spent the past seven years bathing in an endless supply of joy.

And that’s why today is so cool, it’s my favorite day of the year. It’s Julie’s birthday. It’s the day when a most wonderful thing happened, the world got Julie.

We’ve celebrated Julie’s birthday in many different places over the years. One year we cut cake in Korea. On a few occasions, we celebrated the day in Vienna. On a less auspicious year, we spent Julie’s birthday driving down State Line Avenue in Texarkana, wondering if we could possibly stand to live there. (The answer was “no,” but we spent 14 months there anyway.) Last year we took it easy in Dallas after I had worked 10 straight days covering Hurricane Katrina.

This year, we’re celebrating Julie’s birthday from a whole different planet: planet parenthood. We’ve got two sons, and we blessed them in church yesterday (that’s why they’re dressed like girls).
Parenthood has truly bonded us. We know we have to stick together if we are to defeat these two boys and their plan to kill us and devour our brains. They simply cannot be allowed to win.

Later in the day, today, I’ll break out a cake an some presents. But in the end, I’m the one who’s got the best gift. I’ve got Julie. And that makes me happier than anyone has a right to be.

Despite the fact that I am, technically, a professional communicator, I’ve not found a really good way to sum up my feelings for Julie, so I’m forced to turn to popular music.

Now before we go on, you should know that I hate love songs, partly because they cheapen something very beautiful, and also because they just get it wrong. But there’s one that gets it right.

Earlier this year, in anticipation of a road trip, I picked up “Rockin’ the Suburbs” by Ben Folds. It’s not a new album by any stretch of the imagination, but I just never got around to buying it. As the six-months-pregnant Julie and I drove from Medford to Portland, I popped in the disc. At the very end is a tune called “The Luckiest.” It’s a plain spoken, but gorgeous, song about enduring love. And as I listened to it that night, I struggled to keep my composure as we wound our way down a darkened stretch of Oregon highway. And I had to agree with the song’s refrain, “I am the luckiest.”

Thank you, Julie. Every year since I met you has been the best year of my life. Thank you for making me the luckiest.

"The Luckiest"

I don't get many things right the first time
In fact, I am told that a lot
Now I know all the wrong turns, the stumbles and falls
Brought me here

And where was I before the day
That I first saw your lovely face?
Now I see it everyday
And I know

That I am
I am
I am
The luckiest

What if I'd been born fifty years before you
In a house on a street where you lived?
Maybe I'd be outside as you passed on your bike
Would I know?

And in a white sea of eyes
I see one pair that I recognize
And I know

That I am
I am
I am
The luckiest

I love you more than I have ever found a way to say to you

Next door there's an old man who lived to his nineties
And one day passed away in his sleep
And his wife; she stayed for a couple of days
And passed away

I'm sorry, I know that's a strange way to tell you that I know we belong
That I know

That I am
I am
I am
The luckiest