I’m very sorry for missing last week’s Open Thread. I’m not having the greatest time lately, depressed and overwhelmed by a great many things, including a difficulty with sitting upright for more than a few minutes at a time as different parts of my back play a weird game of whack-amal with each other. I’m in the middle of several pieces of work, none of which are fiction, and the green bowl of Mirkwood swells up in all directions telling me there’s no end to the forest, but further, I won’t find the end before the spiders catch up with me.
But it hasn’t all been gloom — besides the numerous lovely things that I’m gathering into a Letter of News for next week, tomorrow is my wedding anniversary.
5 years! The Wooden Anniversary! Trying not to read too much into that when everything is on so much literal and figurative fire, but nevertheless, I have an absurd gift for him that I am excited for him to open tomorrow. Our tentative plan is to drive out to somewhere green and quiet and contemplate the sky.
So I’d love to know: what anniversaries do you celebrate, and how do you celebrate them?
Happy anniversary! Hope it's a pleasant day and gentle on your back. I know back pain is exhausting, so I'm sure you're quite ready to be done with that.
One anniversary I celebrate is May 12th. My mother and I were in a bad car accident on that date in 2000, and now May 12th is Celebrate Life Day in my family. I usually celebrate it by practicing Silly Walks all day (because I *can* walk again) and playing the piano (because I *can* move all my fingers again), and a phone call or at least text chat with the family.
Happy anniversary (I saw what you did with the whacks)! We just celebrated our 50th anniversary in June. When we celebrated our 25th a friend brought back a matched pair of star rubies from Thailand & we designed matched rings to hold them, and had them made by a local jeweler (recommended by our dentist, who was an amateur jeweler). So for our 50th we took 2 sets of graded sunstones we bought years ago & worked with the same jeweler to make 2 rings. Luckily we started more than a year early, so we got the rings before the pandemic started.
We also celebrate Feb 14th every year. Not for Valentine’s Day, but because that was the day I got out of the Army and came home to my girl friend, who later became my wife. We call it lFreedom Day”.
Yikes, Mirkwood. I hope you have a Sting to come to your aid!
I've lost track of my trans anniversaries in the past few years and want to celebrate them again. I'm ten years out as trans now! Maybe I should buy myself a cupcake or something.
Bon anniversaire. My partner and I are just past our tin celebration, and I absolutely didn’t know the fifth was wood? We went to southern England and Iceland for three weeks around October 5, in 2018. Quite a grand time. We often celebrate June 5 instead, which is when we started dating rather than wedding date. Usually with a trip to the mountains, but this year we flopped due to concerns with the ongoing world fire. This is perhaps an excuse to celebrate the marriage in Oct. and camp somewhere lovely and cool past the summer slog.
Smaller celebratory moments include the day we adopted our cat Cinnamonopteryx, who is now a 10 year old bum. Tin again! Just by lavishing him with scritches. Or the day we rescued our second cat from the street sweeper. Our birthdays are quiet excitements of food and small gifts, two weeks apart in August. Mine is usually adjacent a national holiday so we often took a long weekend somewhere new. This year, who knows? Li’s just past was spent kayaking! Which now we have some collapsible boats, is a thing we can up and do whenever weather cooperates. A blessing, that.
On the subject of wood, Hernandez and I sent out your anniversary present yesterday which means it will be late, but that brings me to anniversaries, on the subject of which I will say I tend to make single-day events stretch out to a week at least, if not a month, and I try to have as many as possible, so that I’m constantly celebrating something. I’m sure some fallow period is in order, sometime. I’m just not sure when. I am excited for you to get Stu’s present too; I KNOW WHAT IT IS! Hee hee.
EEEE tomorrow is my wedding anniversary too! 6th, for us. We also celebrate what we call Moviversarmas - move in anniversary before Christmas. When we moved him 400 miles into my little Brooklyn apartment, driving the whole way in the middle of the night with three cats and a dog in the car, there were all these magic moments when things worked perfectly, timingwise. Therefore, it’s our favorite anniversary, and this year will be our tenth :)
So very sorry about your back, and wishing you soothings.
Happy anniversary! And I’m sorry about your back. We celebrated 20 years last year. Every year we we at least go out for dinner, although this year will probably be at home.
Happy anniversary, Amal! My wife and I will be celebrating our fourth in a week and a half. Fourth is apparently fruit and flowers in the US, linen and silk in the UK, or household appliances in "modern", which I suppose is practical but hilariously unromantic. Covid has wreaked havoc on our plans, but we're hoping to find somewhere nearby we can take our dogs for a hike.
I am so sorry for the Mirkwood, the spiders, and the back -- which as I'm guessing you are knowing, might all be flaring up due to the existential OH HOW WE ARE BUGGERED of it all. (I know my shoulders are complaining every day, having nothing to do with much yoga I may or may not due.) Should a post-card from an effective stranger in a foreign land bring you a paper-thin slice of joy, I'd be happy to add you to my postie list. (If you DM me at prof_sje with an address, I promise not to show up in Ottawa with a boom box like Lloyd Dobbler in 'Say Anything').
Meanwhile -- Anniversaries! My wedding anniversary is smack bang before my birthday, a few days after my spouses birthday, and sometimes coincident with American Election Day. So we have a heady melange of Things To Do and Celebrate in early November -- none of which ever quite gets it due. But we celebrate -- usually anniversary presents revolve around doing a thankless icky task for one another. Like "I sorted out the plumber..." or "I took care of that medical insurance paperwork." Quell ROMANCE! But such is our life.
My lab's Anniversary/Birthday is something I think about every year. in 2022 we will be 20 years old. That, is a bracing notion.
Amal, I'm so sorry you've been depressed and overwhelmed. And, as a fellow sufferer of back pain, I'm so sorry about that as well :( It really, really sucks.
Yay anniversaries though! We celebrated 5th date-aversary in 2017, and it was wonderful :) I did not know about the wood tradition, so I got her a flying lesson! I got this beeeeautiful handmade wooden sushi tray set, engraved with our initials, which we enjoy to this day. Now we have to decide whether to have another wooden anniversary for our celebration, or to count all the years since we started dating -- probably going to end up doing the former. I hope you have an amazing day and I wish for you to find your way out of Mirkwood soon! <3
Oh, back pain is the worst! Hope it gets better fast. I don't celebrate anniversaries, either. I am notorious for forgetting my own birthday (and rudely being reminded by a bunch of people who know I don't have FB/IG/etc., so make a point of texting me!) My father's and mother's birthdays are unknown/made up (back when you had a baby and waited a while to make sure it stuck around before registering the birth... in a "developing" country... [they're not that old!]) My mom sometimes remembers their anniversary. My partner and I are sure we got together sometime in April 2002 in grad school, but nobody knows the actual date. So in the end, the only thing I do kind of mark/celebrate is my partner's birthday (she likes silly gifts).
Happy anniversary! Hope it's a pleasant day and gentle on your back. I know back pain is exhausting, so I'm sure you're quite ready to be done with that.
One anniversary I celebrate is May 12th. My mother and I were in a bad car accident on that date in 2000, and now May 12th is Celebrate Life Day in my family. I usually celebrate it by practicing Silly Walks all day (because I *can* walk again) and playing the piano (because I *can* move all my fingers again), and a phone call or at least text chat with the family.
Happy anniversary (I saw what you did with the whacks)! We just celebrated our 50th anniversary in June. When we celebrated our 25th a friend brought back a matched pair of star rubies from Thailand & we designed matched rings to hold them, and had them made by a local jeweler (recommended by our dentist, who was an amateur jeweler). So for our 50th we took 2 sets of graded sunstones we bought years ago & worked with the same jeweler to make 2 rings. Luckily we started more than a year early, so we got the rings before the pandemic started.
We also celebrate Feb 14th every year. Not for Valentine’s Day, but because that was the day I got out of the Army and came home to my girl friend, who later became my wife. We call it lFreedom Day”.
Yikes, Mirkwood. I hope you have a Sting to come to your aid!
I've lost track of my trans anniversaries in the past few years and want to celebrate them again. I'm ten years out as trans now! Maybe I should buy myself a cupcake or something.
Happy anniversary! I hope you find your way free of the back pain soon.
We struggled to have our one child. We quietly celebrate the day that something went right.
Bon anniversaire. My partner and I are just past our tin celebration, and I absolutely didn’t know the fifth was wood? We went to southern England and Iceland for three weeks around October 5, in 2018. Quite a grand time. We often celebrate June 5 instead, which is when we started dating rather than wedding date. Usually with a trip to the mountains, but this year we flopped due to concerns with the ongoing world fire. This is perhaps an excuse to celebrate the marriage in Oct. and camp somewhere lovely and cool past the summer slog.
Smaller celebratory moments include the day we adopted our cat Cinnamonopteryx, who is now a 10 year old bum. Tin again! Just by lavishing him with scritches. Or the day we rescued our second cat from the street sweeper. Our birthdays are quiet excitements of food and small gifts, two weeks apart in August. Mine is usually adjacent a national holiday so we often took a long weekend somewhere new. This year, who knows? Li’s just past was spent kayaking! Which now we have some collapsible boats, is a thing we can up and do whenever weather cooperates. A blessing, that.
On the subject of wood, Hernandez and I sent out your anniversary present yesterday which means it will be late, but that brings me to anniversaries, on the subject of which I will say I tend to make single-day events stretch out to a week at least, if not a month, and I try to have as many as possible, so that I’m constantly celebrating something. I’m sure some fallow period is in order, sometime. I’m just not sure when. I am excited for you to get Stu’s present too; I KNOW WHAT IT IS! Hee hee.
EEEE tomorrow is my wedding anniversary too! 6th, for us. We also celebrate what we call Moviversarmas - move in anniversary before Christmas. When we moved him 400 miles into my little Brooklyn apartment, driving the whole way in the middle of the night with three cats and a dog in the car, there were all these magic moments when things worked perfectly, timingwise. Therefore, it’s our favorite anniversary, and this year will be our tenth :)
So very sorry about your back, and wishing you soothings.
Happy anniversary! And I’m sorry about your back. We celebrated 20 years last year. Every year we we at least go out for dinner, although this year will probably be at home.
Happy anniversary, Amal! My wife and I will be celebrating our fourth in a week and a half. Fourth is apparently fruit and flowers in the US, linen and silk in the UK, or household appliances in "modern", which I suppose is practical but hilariously unromantic. Covid has wreaked havoc on our plans, but we're hoping to find somewhere nearby we can take our dogs for a hike.
I am so sorry for the Mirkwood, the spiders, and the back -- which as I'm guessing you are knowing, might all be flaring up due to the existential OH HOW WE ARE BUGGERED of it all. (I know my shoulders are complaining every day, having nothing to do with much yoga I may or may not due.) Should a post-card from an effective stranger in a foreign land bring you a paper-thin slice of joy, I'd be happy to add you to my postie list. (If you DM me at prof_sje with an address, I promise not to show up in Ottawa with a boom box like Lloyd Dobbler in 'Say Anything').
Meanwhile -- Anniversaries! My wedding anniversary is smack bang before my birthday, a few days after my spouses birthday, and sometimes coincident with American Election Day. So we have a heady melange of Things To Do and Celebrate in early November -- none of which ever quite gets it due. But we celebrate -- usually anniversary presents revolve around doing a thankless icky task for one another. Like "I sorted out the plumber..." or "I took care of that medical insurance paperwork." Quell ROMANCE! But such is our life.
My lab's Anniversary/Birthday is something I think about every year. in 2022 we will be 20 years old. That, is a bracing notion.
Amal, I'm so sorry you've been depressed and overwhelmed. And, as a fellow sufferer of back pain, I'm so sorry about that as well :( It really, really sucks.
Yay anniversaries though! We celebrated 5th date-aversary in 2017, and it was wonderful :) I did not know about the wood tradition, so I got her a flying lesson! I got this beeeeautiful handmade wooden sushi tray set, engraved with our initials, which we enjoy to this day. Now we have to decide whether to have another wooden anniversary for our celebration, or to count all the years since we started dating -- probably going to end up doing the former. I hope you have an amazing day and I wish for you to find your way out of Mirkwood soon! <3
Oh, back pain is the worst! Hope it gets better fast. I don't celebrate anniversaries, either. I am notorious for forgetting my own birthday (and rudely being reminded by a bunch of people who know I don't have FB/IG/etc., so make a point of texting me!) My father's and mother's birthdays are unknown/made up (back when you had a baby and waited a while to make sure it stuck around before registering the birth... in a "developing" country... [they're not that old!]) My mom sometimes remembers their anniversary. My partner and I are sure we got together sometime in April 2002 in grad school, but nobody knows the actual date. So in the end, the only thing I do kind of mark/celebrate is my partner's birthday (she likes silly gifts).
Happy anniversary! Please take care, my friend.
Happy Anniversary Amal!
Hope you find relief for your back! (I've invested in an ergonomic chair as a preventative measure.)
Personally I don't celebrate any anniversaries, but I do get dragged to my family's birthdays, death anniversaries, etc.