2 Years & Counting

This is the springtime of my loving - the second season I am to know
You are the sunlight in my growing - so little warmth I've felt before.
It isn't hard to feel me glowing - I watched the fire that grew so low.

It is the summer of my smiles - flee from me Keepers of the Gloom.
Speak to me only with your eyes. It is to you I give this tune.
Ain't so hard to recognize - These things are clear to all from
time to time. 

--Led Zeppelin  "The Rain Song"

Funny how songs pop up that have instant meaning.  I am listening to Radio Paradise--it is an online "radio station" which I love--they play such a cool variety of songs & usually & uncannily they seem to match my mood quite a bit.  It is raining & I sit here waiting for Xing Fu so that we can have dinner & I've turned introspective.  "The Rain Song" came on & it just fit so well.  Xing Fu teases me because I get tired of hearing Led Zep all of the time on his XM satellite especially since they seem to only play "Stairway to Heaven" or "Kashmir" & ask him to turn it off.  But I'd forgotten about about this song--how beautiful it is & how peaceful.  It reminds me of how I am with Xing Fu--peaceful.

Narrowing down on 2 years together--I am such an incurable romantic--I go back & re-read posts & old emails--because sometimes I have to pinch myself that what has happened with us has happened & that two years later I'm even more sure of where we're headed together.  Have we been lucky, was it timing, synchronicity, or all of the above?  I remember writing about "Red Flags" at one point early on in our relationship & now, I still find that overall there just aren't any.  Sure, there are the realities of any relationship that has developed over a longer period of time--we don't always see eye to eye, believe it or not & we have had a couple wicked arguments.  But those are few & far between & for the most part we tend to resolve our issues through discussion--it may be heated but it is discussed & not hidden to fester into resentment.  I also think about the idea of fighting fair--all of the advice columns talk about that--not calling names, belittling during an argument, etc.  And the cool thing is that we don't do any of those things.  I used to so I'm kinda hyper-aware of that & other bad behaviors from my past.  But they seem not to be there.  My friends & family remark on how much calmer I am now--I think I am too--Xing Fu makes me feel happy & warm; glowing, if you will--even 2 years out.  Yeah, it's not that "head-over-heels" kind of love where I was giddy ALL of the time for about six months (probably more), but a quieter one, a content one.  A happy frog one.

Happy Frogs

Cape Henlopen State Park

Yikes!  Where did the time go?  I just spent the last week at the beach with Xing Fu & 2 of his kids.  I'm learning how to be "stepmom".  And contrary to what I've been reading & at this point, have stopped reading, things seem to be going quite well. Now don't get me wrong--it's not all flowers & butterflies all the time, & I did have moments of aggravation, but overall our beach week was a success on many levels. It was another test of a sort.  Not necessarily Xing Fu testing me, well maybe just a little,  always a question about how good the fit with his kids.  (Me too with my son--but I've long since decided that was not needed at all.)  But the grrr moments were very few & far in between & I think we all walked away feeling pretty good about the week.  Yay us!  I still think about some of the advice in the Stepmother books, & try to be realistic about it all. And recently I've been reviewing my own stepmothers' performances (my one stepmom is only 9 years older than me...HUGE issue when I was growing up--mega teenage 'tude, ya' know?) ) & my mom's stepmother performance to sorta bounce the way I'm doing the step thing off of theirs.  My mom has told me how impressed she is--great--the true test is how Xing Fu's kids feel & he says that they felt it was a great week so there it is.

Xing Fu wrote me an email this morning telling me that he's a Happy Frog.  One of our sailing friends dubbed him a Happy Frog a few months ago--we now talk about that--I've asked him at different times if he's a "Happy Frog".  At Screwpile, our skipper bought a smiling frog wind whirligig thingy & we tied it to the backstay where it grinned down at us until the first gybe--blew off his whirligig.  Actually, the whole frog was left & he continued grinning at us the rest of the regatta. So I must be the princess who kissed the frog--a reference to kissing a ton of frogs when I was dating--lucky me--it took a while but good karma is good karma.

It's continuing to be a good summer--now to get through the next two weeks until my kiddo comes back from camp--he was definitely missed on our beach trip but there's always next year.