SERIES: 31 Reasons The Hubs and I Have Lasted 17 Years, #5

#5: Even though we have aged 17+ years and gained more pounds than we care to count, we still see the people we fell in love with when we look at each other, not the people we are now.  

The hubs likes to buy me souvenir t-shirts when he goes someplace without me.  They are all in the size I wore when we got married.  I can't wear any of them because they are too small.  And he is not doing this to flatter me or earn brownie points; he literally thinks I am still that small, bless his heart.  He still sees this hair when he looks at me, even though I've chopped it off several times:

A picture of me working the teller line in the mid-nineties. Pay no attention to the bug crawling on the camera lens!

Neither one of us sees the grey hairs on the other.  Anytime I see him walk across a room, the church sanctuary, up a grocery store aisle, I see him as the first time I laid eyes on him - the sexiest man to ever wear a double-breasted suit (it was olive green and really set off his eyes).

What allows us to view each other through 17 year old, rose-colored glasses?  No matter how much we have changed and grown over the years, what attracted us to each other is still there and that is what we see.  I look into his eyes and see the confident, outgoing, funny, gentle giant of the first real man I'd ever dated.  He looks into my eyes and sees the sexy but feisty woman who threw up walls to protect her heart but rewarded him with loyalty and unconditional love when he proved she was worth taking the time to knock those walls down.

You fall in love with someone for a reason.  People can so easily forget that reason or believe it's gone forever.  I'll be honest, somedays it is harder to find that reason than others, but it's our job to find it in each other, to take the time to see it, as well as take the time to show it.

Don't miss any posts in this series:

31 Reasons The Hubs and I Have Lasted 17 Years, #1

31 Reasons The Hubs and I Have Lasted 17 Years, #2

31 Reasons The Hubs and I Have Lasted 17 Years, #3

31 Reasons The Hubs and I Have Lasted 17 Years, #4

31 Reasons The Hubs and I Have Lasted 17 Years, #5

31 Reasons The Hubs and I Have Lasted 17 Years, #6

31 Reasons The Hubs and I Have Lasted 17 Years, #7

31 Reasons The Hubs and I Have Lasted 17 Years, #8

31 Reasons The Hubs and I Have Lasted 17 Years, #9
31 Reasons The Hubs and I Have Lasted 17 Years, #10
31 Reasons The Hubs and I Have Lasted 17 Years, #11
31 Reasons The Hubs and I Have Lasted 17 Years, #12
31 Reasons The Hubs and I Have Lasted 17 Years, #13
31 Reasons The Hubs and I Have Lasted 17 Years, #14
31 Reasons The Hubs and I Have Lasted 17 Years, #15
31 Reasons The Hubs and I Have Lasted 17 Years, #16
31 Reasons The Hubs and I Have Lasted 17 Years, #17
31 Reasons The Hubs and I Have Lasted 17 Years, #18
31 Reasons The Hubs and I Have Lasted 17 Years, #19
31 Reasons The Hubs and I Have Lasted 17 Years, #20
31 Reasons The Hubs and I Have Lasted 17 Years, #21
31 Reasons The Hubs and I Have Lasted 17 Years, #22
31 Reasons The Hubs and I Have Lasted 17 Years, #23
31 Reasons The Hubs and I Have Lasted 17 Years, #24
31 Reasons The Hubs and I Have Lasted 17 Years, #25
31 Reasons The Hubs and I Have Lasted 17 Years, #26
31 Reasons The Hubs and I Have Lasted 17 Years, #27
31 Reasons The Hubs and I Have Lasted 17 Years, #28
31 Reasons The Hubs and I Have Lasted 17 Years, #29
31 Reasons The Hubs and I Have Lasted 17 Years, #30
31 Reasons The Hubs and I Have Lasted 17 Years, #31