My Prince

This one goes to my husband. He is everything any girl could dream of.
I have always thought of him as my prince. After all the frogs, I finally found a really good looking, funny, courageous prince....who ,surprise surprise, chose me to sit next to him on the Heide throne.
In the beginning (heheheh)..............
Ok - lets not do that whole thing. But seriously, the beginning of our relationship was really hard. Most couples face the furnaces only after being married and these fires cement an already steady relationship. We did it the other way around. We walked through fire and came out the other end smouldering, clothing in tatters, but still hanging onto each other.
I would love to say it got easier after that, but life interrupts happily ever afters every time.
The first thing that springs to mind about him when I think of him is his sense of humour.
He makes me laugh.
His ability to laugh at himself is so endearing. I have a photo of him on holiday and have sent it to some of our work colleague's with the caption "the hobo I picked up on holiday". He has taken as giggled at this as much as I did when I told him about it.
I think this is even more surprising to people who do not know him well, because the first impression of him is of someone who is very serious or severe.
I delight in watching people respond to him, even though at times the little green monster comes out to growl.
Through the years I have seldom seen him cry , and invariably the tear that glints in his eye has been brought there by one of the many animals we have both fallen in love with.
I can still see him getting up at 3 in the morning to rescue Louis from ants. Louis was a pinkie at the time, and Andreas had set up a cage with lights and blankets to keep this little scrap warm between his two hourly feeds (which we took turns in giving him). He woke up to this tiny little screeching sound and checked on his "son", who was at that time was covered in ants (attracted to him by the milk smell I guess). From that time until he was old enough to fend for himself (about 2 mths later) Louis slept in Andreas hand in our bed. Andreas doesn't move around when asleep so all of our furry family chose to sleep with him at night.
This very proper man went to Board meetings with this rat in his pocket (we took turns looking after him at work)...........he was never concerned about what the rest of these very important people may think when they saw these little whiskers poking out......can you imagine the expressions. I so wish I was there to see it!
That was Louis.
Then there was Cleo. Another scrap who was not expected to live, but she was babied grew into a beautiful little cat who had no idea she was a cat. When she became a mommy,he was there stroking her and talking to her helping her give birth to her very own four babies.
Short of breaking out a cigar, anyone would have thought these were his very first grandchildren.
These and the other furry family members tribulations have proved to me that my prince truly has a heart of gold.
While these memories bring warmth into my heart, the way that he has loved the girls fills me with awe.
Last night when I got home, I saw for the first time, that our older child had brought that same teary glint to his eyes.
I have , over the years, sometimes felt alone as he does not always understand when I get all emotional over things.
The Leo drama queen has never been allowed to build mountains as the logical Aquarian has seen and pointed out the mole hills that they were.
This year , through our current little bump in the road, the prince has turned into a knight. He has seen and listened and supported at every turn.
The Aquarian and Leo have finally met half way.
He sometimes catches me staring at him. The love and gratitude I feel over take common sense and I find myself just drinking him in. He calls these my creepy moments.
He says (laughing) that I'm a pretty scary person. Yip - think he knows that should he ever decide to leave he may be in some really big trouble. Her Royal Highness the Hippo has really mean thought of what she may do , should he ever leave her to fend for herself.
Thoughts of scalpels come to mind.