RIDING DRAG / NO COMPLAINTS

In a time when so many women are complaining about what worthless men they are married to I would like to take this opportunity to voice my own complaint about the man I married. It really gripes me that he always gets his anniversary card for me into the mail and to me before our actual anniversary! There, I said it and I mean it! It’s not that I don’t get him a card because I do. It is sitting right here beside my computer and I had every intent to get it into the mail in time this year, but you all know how I am about good intentions.


Thirty years ago I met Husband (yes, he still refuses to be called by name in my column) at a birthday party. I was not impressed with him until we started talking and realized we had friends on common and that when we were kids we went to the same church where my uncle was preaching revivals. I also found out that he loved going to farm auctions, junk stores, cocoanut pie and old people. (He can spend hours listening and absorbing.)

We didn’t ever really date. Our ‘dates’ usually consisted of the two of us working out at the farm in Louisburg or him working extra hours for a portable building company. His proposal consisted of, “Hey, do you realize if we got married that my car insurance would go down $125 every six months? That would give us $250 a year to do something fun with. So, do you want to?” I told him he was an idiot and to get away from me. Over the next couple of weeks my best friend Chris told me I was the idiot and that I should take him up on the offer even if it wasn’t a very romantic proposal. “He’s practical and careful with his money. You won’t ever have to support him like you did your first one. Besides, he follows you around like you are queen and does all your dirty jobs around here for you.” She was right and I am forever grateful to her for her advice.

Twenty-nine years ago we got married in a Texas courthouse in a ceremony officiated by a judge who hadn’t married anyone in 20 years, his secretary as one witness and the fish & game officer (who showed up to turn in tickets for fishing without a license that he had written that day) as the other witness. It was 105 degrees and the air-conditioning in the courthouse was out. We laughed through the ceremony as sweat dripped off our faces, accepted the well-wishes of our impromptu wedding party and had our wedding lunch at a place called ‘The Cuckoo’s Nest’ across the street. There was no honeymoon as we had not yet saved the $250 from the insurance going down. Instead we drove to Oklahoma to tell my folks that we had gotten married.

He was my friend before I married him. He is my friend now. We do not always agree but we know where to draw the line. He works on the road and is gone out of state a lot and I accept that because his hard work all these years has afforded me the luxury of staying home to raise our kids and now our grand-son. He trusts my judgment in running the ranch and gives me free hand in all decisions. He understands my afflictions and addictions (writing and horses), he is the best Dad and Paw-Paw ever and he has an ordained ability with horses. There is plenty there to like and even more to love.

I could go on, but I was supposed to be complaining about his faults. Let’s see…where was I? Oh yes, there’s that card thing AND when it comes to gift giving he can never seem to buy me clothes that fit. He seems to think I am still a size 10. Sheesh girls! What is his problem?

Is he perfect? No. Is he a real Keeper? Yes.

Thank you, Husband, for twenty-nine years of sharing, working, dreaming, laughing and darned little to complain about! And thank you, for still being my friend. By the way, I spent that $250 insurance savings on an airline ticket. Guess where I’ll be flying to come Sept. 5th? Happy Anniversary!


*Contact Debra Coppinger Hill at ridingdrag@gmail.com
http://alwayscowboy.net/debra_coppinger_hill_poetry.html



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RIDING DRAG with DEBRA COPPINGER HILL is featured each week at ALWAYS COWBOY where Debra is a Resident Western Poet. Join her and her Cowboy Friends for Cowboy Poetry, News & Events. http://alwayscowboy.net/debra_coppinger_hill_poetry.html
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