I have several friends going through a divorce and several others floating in murky marriages. I’ve swum through these familiar rivers and felt like I was drowning but have definitely emerged less cynical and more hopeful, lucky to have found Love (THE REAL DEAL) the second time around and witnessing the collapse of other marriages, I am grateful for second chances.

Marriage has peaks and valleys and it takes work, just like any other worthy relationship; with our parents, our siblings, our children. A romantic relationship is organic and malleable and falling in love is easier than staying in love. But it’s also scientifically proven that being madly in love can last. 

I love to write about loving my husband and about our Romance. I reflect on those magic moments which sparked our life. Love sets entire lives in motion. Love is the sun around which our entire universe circles. It’s romantic and perhaps cliche, but ultimately true.

Also, my husband is my 365-project editor and these essays serve as modern-day passive love notes. Reliving our enchanting courtship in my writing keeps it alive. Recounting our romance is the best we have to a time machine and as we muse over where it all began, our eyes lock and transport us there instantly.

Of course, with a cinematic and poetic story like ours, who wouldn’t want to spend a lifetime coasting on its wave?

Here’s a glimpse:

It was a fairytale romance in every sense of the word with NYC the quintessential background and silent, enthusiastic matchmaker; the eternal dramatic third wheel. She hugged us with culture and food and music, sprinkling us with snow storms, remaking the concrete jungle into a perpetual Christmas morning for us to re-wake up to every day. When he had his first party to introduce me to his friends, it was on his rooftop, lit up by the glow of the Empire State Building. (So what if three of his dude friends hit on me and kept asking me what our “status” was.) Before we knew what are status was we were head over heels. Our first vacation was to Disney World. The Magic Kingdom had nothing on our amorous wizardry.

We went to Philharmonic concerts in Central Park where we fell asleep under a blanket after indulging in a rare batch of homemade sangria and woke up to fireworks. We emerged as the happiest, luckiest, most in love couple. We travelled to London and mastered the infamous couples selfie before the teenagers and before Instagram sucked the privacy out of romance. We had a song – and eventually, we had a whole disk of songs. (Back when we still made disks.) We danced in the rain on my fire escape on 97th Street. On New Year’s Eve, we bundled up and watched fireworks over Central Park and the midnight run right after. We strolled the streets of Greenwich Village, giggling like teenagers, feeling like we were getting away with something devious. We walked, fingers intertwined, leaning into each other, reminiscing about our different experiences at our mutual alma mater. We ate shabu shabu and had “love cake” for dessert. We went to see Matisyahu and had so much fun smashing into the crowds, surrounded by our friends, and my boyfriend peed in his beer cup because it was easier than finding the bathroom. When we visited my parents in Staten Island, we always took the ferry with a perfect fall evening sunset to usher us into the dock.

Early on he would say he wanted to “climb in love” with me because falling implied it wasn’t by choice, but he definitely fell. Our connection was instant and it went beyond words. When we touched, we felt a heat. When our eyes met, there was always a mutual spark. We loved all the same things for different reasons and we came from different places, travelled on different paths, but arrived at the same place at the crossroads in our lives when we were destined to meet. 

We could have met a million places around the city, as classmates at NYU or as neighbors on 27th Street … but we met when our hearts were open and ready. 

As Shakespeare is famous for saying “readiness is all.”

Tagged: 365, 365 Day Project, 365 day writing project, 365 writing project, divorce, falling in love, marriage, relationships, romance, writing