What Does 17 Years of Marriage Look Like?

Mr. Foxy and I recently celebrated our seventeenth wedding anniversary. It’s not a milestone anniversary so I actually had to do the math to remember what year we were celebrating. Okay, I have to do the math every year. Ah, love…

Anyhow, we like to celebrate our anniversary with a nice dinner at our favorite restaurant. This year, as luck would have it, our anniversary fell on a Saturday. So we dumped dropped the kids at Grandma’s house and headed out to that favorite restaurant. It was a late reservation by our standards: 7:30. That meant we’d have to stay up for awhile before going to sleep or the food would keep us up. And we’d be gassy and uncomfortable in our bed—no fun at all.

Seventeen years of marriage is pretty special. And we had some very special conversations all through that night.

While driving to the restaurant, these statements could be heard in our car. Bonus point if you can guess who said what.

• “Oh no! Leave the disco station on. That’s perfect for our anniversary.”
• “The wonderful thing about our marriage is we don’t have to be together. Wait, that came out wrong.”
• “Those sneezes almost made me puke.”

Clearly the night started out with pure romance. Once we got to the restaurant, we had some drinks while we waited for our table. I had some bubbly, and he had something with bourbon. We managed to keep our phones in our pockets the entire time.

After we were seated and the waiter came by to tell about the specials, Mr. Foxy leaned over and said, “Dude. That waiter BUGS.” Mr. Foxy, who usually isn’t bothered by much (he is married to me remember), started mimicking some of the things she had said, “That’s PUUUURFECT. Oh, xxxxxxcellent. Sure thing, HUN.” We laughed and agreed that a perfect dinner isn’t complete without something to complain about. The waiter was providing just that.

During our first course, I insisted that we take a picture of us toasting. I tried doing it, but I am not very coordinated and almost dropped my phone in the food. So Mr. Foxy took over. Only after I looked at the picture he took, I told him we couldn’t use that one.

Mr. Foxy: “Why not?”

Me: “Just finish this course, and then we can talk about it.”

So we ate the first course and sipped our wine. (Both were delicious.)

Mr. Foxy, upon finishing the last bite: “Okay. why can’t we use that photo?”

Me: “Well look at it. Doesn’t the bowl look like a toilet that’s been puked in? It’s a puke-toilet bowl.”

Mr. Foxy: “Yeah, I guess it does. Thanks for waiting until after we ate it to mention that.”

Me: “Of course. See, this is what 17 years looks like. Me holding off on an inappropriate comment until after you eat.”

Fortunately, that comment didn’t ruin either of our appetites. Dinner was delicious, and we ate way too much and even ordered dessert and coffee. And we had a few more choice quotables:

• “I’ll finish the wine, but I have to burp to make some room first.”
• “This rum-sauce is so good I wanna drink it like soup and french kiss the bowl.”

We paid the bill and waddled to our car to head home. We contemplated a movie, but neither of us was familiar with anything playing. While driving home from the restaurant, we discussed how awesome the dinner was. And there were a few more choice one-liners:

• “I can hardly wait to put yoga pants on.”
• ‘You know, if ours was a shotgun wedding our kids would be going off to college.”
• “This neighborhood is just the right amount of snotty. I could live here.”

About when we got home, we got a text from some friends who invited us to join them for drinks. The conversation went a bit like this:

Me: “You wanna meet the Smiths for drinks?”

Mr. Foxy: “Sure. It’s either that or go home and fall asleep in front of the TV.”

Me: “True dat.”

And that, my friends, is what 17 years of marital bliss looks like.