The old man sat comfortably in his chair. He shuffled through a small wooden box that contained some of his most cherished memories. As he shuffled through the box the old man took a second to look around his home. Not just glance, but really take a deep look at everything he had created. Pictures of angels and cats littered the walls, and the sweet smell of pumpkin scented candles filled the air. The grandkids' toys were scattered about the living room and a small pacifier sat on the small glass table by his wife's favorite chair.
His wife. The thought of her ignited a light inside the old man, and as if the wooden box had read his mind, a memory leapt out from beneath the pictures.
A young girl smiled back up at him. Even though the picture was worn and faded, the smile was never brighter. The woman's eyes shone with a fierce determination he was all too familiar with; it was a smile that filled even the darkest of souls with warmth. Her small dainty hands wrapped themselves around a tree as her brown hair spilled ever so elegantly all the way down to her butt. A white sweater hugged her body and the old man could almost see the orange and red leaves fall to the ground. What really caught the old man's eye wasn't a tree or an outfit, but the woman's eyes.
Blue? No. Bright green? Definitely not. Her eyes were a warm brown, like a cup of hot cocoa on a crisp fall morning. Tiny flecks of green dotted her iris' like tiny pixies playing their own movie just for him; they were eyes that looked right at him. They looked up at the 70-year-old man replaying the memory and at the 18-year-old boy who had fallen in love with a girl. Her eyes brought him back to the ice rink on their first date and her eyes brought him to some of the toughest times he's ever had in his life.
"Just rest your head on me," her eyes seemed to say. "It's OK, everything will be OK."
The words spoke to him right though the shiny photo paper. Even though the paper was ripped and torn, the memory of her never was. In the old man's mind, the memory of her was even more precious than when he had taken the picture.
The old man let the memory play out in his head before placing the picture back in the box. He slowly rose from his chair and made his way to the back porch. The birds chirped outside and the sun gleamed through the glass in the doors. An old woman sat perched in a chair reading a book, her reading glasses barely holding up on her small, wrinkled face. The old man trudged along and sat down in front of her, not saying a word. The old woman set down her book, obviously annoyed, and swiped off her reading glasses.
"Can I help you with something?" she said.
The old man smiled and just stared. Her hair had turned completely gray, her skin had become wrinkled and pale, and she never bothered to put on makeup. To anybody else she would be different in every aspect, I mean at almost 70 years old what would one expect?
Her eyes were, however, the same. They still created a warmth when she gazed at him, they comforted him in ways he couldn't explain. They were still the gorgeous brown eyes of the girl that smiled back at him in the middle of the woods. They were no different than the girl who use to belt Rascal Flatts with him in the passenger seat of his 1999 Chrysler Sebring. She was still the girl who comforted him as he cried when his childhood dog Sammy died in his arms. She was the only girl he had ever gazed upon and been completely vulnerable. The woman in front of him was still the girl he had fallen in love with when he was 18 years old.
The old man wasn't just looking at a woman, he was looking at 60 years in the making. Every overtime, every heartbreak and every sharp ounce of pain was worth being able to stare into her beautiful brown eyes and feel something real. To be able to build their home together and build their family from scratch. Everything he had ever been worried about in life was somehow made OK by those doe brown eyes. Everything he had stayed up at night wishing for was right there next to him, and he tried every day to remember that.
So the old man would wake up, have his morning cup of coffee and open his wooden box. In the box was a new picture for every new day they got to spend together. The old man would relive a new memory every morning, so he would never forget why each day was so special. He needed the reminder that every morning is a blessing and one of the best blessings he had received was the woman who sat in front of him.
He never said any of this to her though, because she already knew. They could both feel the love they shared every day. They could see it in their kids, their grandkids, in each new dawn that brought them a fresh new day to fall deeper in love. The old man didn't spell out his love because he could see it in her eyes, and she could see it in his.
"How'd you sleep honey bear?" was all he said. That's all he needed to say because even after 60 years he never seemed to be amazed by her. He had promised himself he'd grown old with the love of his life... And he knew just by looking at her that his wish had come true.
