08 March 2003

We've had this little ritual going for a few days now: whoever wakes up first pokes the other a couple of times, says good morning, provokes some kissing and snuggling, and asks: "will you marry me?"

The other person grins, snuggles more aggressively, and says, "yes."

It's horrifically cheesy.

Jake and I are so cheesy, ALL the time, that we make people retch. Once, we were making out at a stoplight, and the girl in the car next to us tried to slit her wrists. The cuteness was just overwhelming I guess.

(I guess that's a little bit of an exaggeration...)

Jake and I have known each other six months now. Which is weird, because we STILL can't have a five-minute conversation without making out a LITTLE bit... We can be having a conversation about mass graves and heaps of decaying people, and we'll have to stop at around the five-minute mark to make out. Last night, Jake forwarded me an email about "weapons of mass destruction" and addressed it to some cutesy name or another that he devised for me. Six whole months, and we're still this gross???

The REALLY frightening part is that I sort of enjoy it.

What am I saying? I REALLY enjoy it.

Yuck.

Will I marry Jake? Am I willing, today, to be his wife, with all of the boring implications of that? Am I willing to love and honor and cherish (and all that business) Jake, despite the fact that he's got a cold and spent the majority of last night blowing his nose in my ear, and making weird chewing noises? Despite his occasionally lousy taste in music? Despite the fact that he mocks me for ranting on about etymologies of words for which I don't actually KNOW the etymologies? Do I REALLY want to marry somebody, when it means I'm either going to have to cook for the rest of my life, or eat frozen TV dinners and McDonald's hamburgers and ramen? Do I want to marry Jake knowing that it will mean I can't hitch-hike anymore, that I can only play my freaky music when he's not around to make gagging faces, that I'm going to get taunted for the rest of my life for being small and scrawny? I'm only twenty-two, and I'm going to give up my career of flirting and being a typical college-aged slut -- for THIS man? This is the guy I'm going to bring to school reunions? This is the face I'm going to wake up to every morning until one of us dies? This is the man who will bring me my medication when I'm an old lady? THIS is the fellow I'm going to have and hold, etc., etc., even when he's got a cold and is making chewing noises all fucking night?

Yes.

Weird, huh?

Jake's eyes sparkle when he's happy. My dog, Heidi, used to have eyes like that. You'd give her a microscopic piece of something moldy from the refrigerator, and she'd look at you with this reverent, astonished look: this total disbelief that anybody could be so beautiful and generous and caring, as to give her a microscopic piece of moldy shit from the refrigerator. Jake kind of looks at me the same way sometimes. It's pitiful, but beautiful at the same time. I can be sitting at the edge of the bed with my hair sticking out every which way, putting on my socks and complaining about something, and Jake will be looking at me like I just handed him the moon.

I wish I could live up to the things Jake thinks I am. I guess, in trying to be a goddess for those eyes, I can be assured it won't be a stagnant relationship.

We go to the casino sometimes at night; it's a good place to go when you're broke, because you can get free soda all night and watch other people try to win lots of money. We sit at a table, and smoke, and talk... Sometimes we talk for three or four hours. I talk about prepositions, vampires, and insane people I know from Binghamton; Jake talks about his movie, world travel, and insane people he knows from his days as a taxi driver. I've told him ALL the same stories about ALL the same people about a billion and a half times, and he STILL doesn't tell me to shove my incessant chatter up my ass. He's been talking to me about the movie since the night we met -- not usually NEW things about the movie, either -- and although my eyes glaze over sometimes, I still sit there grinning at him like a fool.

We talk about bowel movements a LOT. I don't have any idea why. I guess bowel movements are sort of mysterious. Keeping the mystery alive in our relationship, perhaps? Ah, romance...

Sometimes Jake and I go to the gym at Fort Lewis to work out. We figure we'll be at the top of Mount Rainier sooner that way. He teases me for not being able to lift more than a soup can's worth of weight, and I tease him for not keeping up with me on the treadmill. Then we make out.

I pick the vegetables off my pizza and give them to Jake. Then I eat his pepperonis. I give him the lettuce from my cheeseburgers, and he reluctantly lets me scarf some of his fries.

I love this man. We bring out each other's grossness, but I love him.

He walks into the room as I'm typing this, kisses me about a billion times, shows me some tricks he can do wih his yo-yo, and stares at the computer screen to see what I'm writing. He knows it's about him. He's trying to be very sneaky. I send him to the other room to play with his yo-yo. I feel kinda bad for banishing him. Later, I'll give him a personal lap dance... Shhh... don't tell: it's a surprise...

Sometimes we drive, and drive, and drive... We make jokes that are totally inappropriate. We sing along to gahd-awful annoying songs, such as "Baby Got Back," by Sir Mix-A-Lot. Or I have Jake sing me the blues, when there's nothing on the radio, and we're sick of the CDs. Jake's from Memphis, which automatically qualifies him to sing the blues. He sings:

I got a good woman...
With the meanest dog in town...
He got teeth like Margaret Thatcher...
An' he weighs 'bout five hundred pounds...
'An I got the blues!

We got that from a forwarded email. Amazing how much soul you can put into a forwarded email. In addition to Jake's talents with the blues, he and I are going to put together a heavy metal and rap band. We were listening to some contemporary Christian music, this wimpy, annoying whiny crap about trusting Jesus. I'm fine with music no matter what, but stuff about Jesus shouldn't be s'damned wimpy. So Jake and I decided that if we had a religious band, it would be hardcore. REALLY hardcore... We'd do Old Testament stuff about slayings and wrath and abominations. And begats. A sampling:

[Jake:] Yo, yo, yo, whaddup, Big G?
[God:] YOUR FIRST SON BELONGS TO ME!

Naturally, the song ends with a slaying.

Will I marry Jake? Even though he's sort of gross, and he makes me grosser than I already am, and sometimes he drools when I'm stripping, and sometimes he gets toothpaste in the sink and doesn't clean it off... and sometimes he does dumb stuff like asking for the recipe for tea... and sometimes we're eerily comfortable with each other, and we hang out in the bathroom together while one of us is peeing... and sometimes he tickles me and I kick at him, and we end up moving the bed clear across the room... and sometimes Jake's a TOTAL dumbass and invites the Mormons over to patronizingly lecture us about stuff we already know, and stuff we don't care to know, and we sit there nodding and smiling and trying not to giggle... and sometimes... the list goes on... OH, does it go on...

Will I marry this guy?

....I don't see how I COULDN'T...

My hero and my pet puppy, my master and my servant, my best friend and my lover, my family, my husband, and everything I ever wanted in a partner... I'm going to marry Jake. I'm going to marry him and make him food so we don't have to eat Ramen. I'm going to marry him and chatter on about prepositions until death do us part. I'm going to wake up next to Jake every morning of my life. I'm going to fold all his shirts and he's going to unfold them and hang them, and then we'll pounce on each other for a mock-beating.

When Jake and I are smiling at each other, I can't wait for the rest of my life to happen...

I am the luckiest person in the whole world.

~Helena Thomas [Jensen]*