A Birthday Card For My Husband

September 25, 2022, we will celebrate my husband’s forty-eighth birthday. For twenty-six years, David and I have been one-upping each other on our Hallmark card selections. Sometimes, nearly choosing the same card. Whether funny or sentimental, it’s never difficult to find one with the perfect message. (The Between You and Me product line has been a long time favorite). For many years, Hallmark has saved me from feeling like I had to post an embarrassing Facebook post. As long as he knew how I felt, it was sufficient.

This year, I’m intentionally spending more time in my thoughts. Recharging my batteries and prioritizing things that are important to me. I want to use this new-found energy to get out of my comfort zone, which includes writing and speaking more openly. There is no better topic for me to start with, than David. This year, I thought I would write the card myself AND make up for the lack of Facebook posts throughout the years.

It is fitting, because it was David who started my love of writing. We met in 1996, while working at a summer camp for adults with developmental disabilities in Cold Spring, NY. He was a camp counselor and I was the lake life guard. After a whirlwind summer (a story for another chapter), he returned home to England and I went back to my junior year at college in Pennsylvania. Not only did students not have laptops in 1996, we scarcely had email and we certainly did not have Facetime, Zoom, What’s App or texting. Phone calls, charged by the minute, were expensive, so we began to exchange letters. We shared the most mundane moments of our day as well as the most exciting moments of our dreams. This lasted for about three years when David moved to the US on a work visa. We got to spend all our moments together from that point forward. To this day, there is no one else I’d rather spend my time with.

Finding Hallmark cards to celebrate special moments was easy because he fits all the categories.

• He’s funny. No card section can contain the jokes and allegories his entertaining brain can hold.

• He’s loving. The words of encouragement and comfort he gives, in the high and low moments, flow freely.

• He’s spiritual. His prayers lift your eyes to the heavens and away from your fear and worry.

He is the husband, father, son, brother, uncle & friend you’d want in your corner.

I don’t know how I got so lucky….well, blessed really, to live this life with you, David O’Sullivan, but rather than six different cards to tell you, for this birthday, I’ve written my own.

Happy birthday. I love you.