Twelve

Dear Olivia,

Last night, when you went to sleep, you were eleven. This morning, when you woke up, an anniversary was marked. A moment in time where the earth stopped, twelve years ago, and the whole world changed. We will never be the same. I remember the moment I became somebody's sister, your sister, and the doctor held you up in the air, your gooey, slimy, pink, little self, and announced your arrival to the world. And suddenly, our 47 year old mother had just performed a miracle, and I became a sister, and Daddy held his own little, pink, baby, and you totally captured our hearts. I don't remember all of the specific dates of the milestones of your infancy. I do remember that the sibling I had always hoped for changed everything.
You cried at night, and slept during the day, and ate the weirdest stuff. You liked to eat butter, straight up, spoonfuls at a time. You were absolutely obsessed with little orphan Annie. Maybe you could explain to me why you needed to watch that movie 42 times a day? You sang Britney Spears songs on the coffee table. You snuck into my room while I was at school and poured nail polish all over my carpet. You went through a phase where you labeled everything in marker, like my "chrash can," in Sharpie, for instance. Thanks for that, by the way. You loved pooh. And pooing. You owe me at least 3493 dirty diaper changes on your future neices and nephews, just so you know. During your Mulan phase, you put your beautiful hair in a pony tail on the top of your head and cut it off (maybe you were trying to be a samurai or something?). You wore princess dresses for bed, and around the house, and to the grocery store and the park and Home Depot.

Then, somewhere along the line, my little, baby, sister suddenly became a person. A walking, talking, person, with gifts and ideas and the best sense of humor i've ever seen. You started making movies that have captivated everyone I know. On more than one occasion, someone has come up to me and told me that they watch your movies when they are having a bad day and it makes their day much better. I agree, you could make any bad day good. Youre a little spitfire now, who is quick on her feet and able to take on any one. You are resilient and capable and determined and brilliant. Absolutely brilliant.

You are beautiful, even during your "awkward phase,"and dang girl, you can shake it. You can hold your own in a conversation with people who are in college, and sometimes I think my friends would rather hang out with you than me. I don't blame them. You are way funnier than I could ever be. You are eager to learn about God's love and quick to express it. And you are so, so, loved. Being in middle school is hard, really hard, and you are continuing to approach it with grace and charisma. I am so proud of who you are. And who you will become. Your attitude towards life is contagious. Hold onto your child-like faith as you continue to take on the world. Seek God. Ask Questions. Be yourself.
My little air-fry, le cremeee, liver, boo, olive, peanut, cheeseburger, sibling, you are an absolute dream come true.
Happy twelfth birthday.
I love you.

Als

Not sick of you yet.

My longest relationship before I married Omar was eleven months, and I was in tenth grade.
I dated other guys, but there was always a period of three or four months in the middle of our relationship where I had broken up with them because I was bored, dated someone else, gotten bored, gotten back together with them, only to get bored and break up with them again.
I have the attention span of a gnat, and thought that my life's purpose was be to be a girl who was gifted in perpetually falling in love, but not staying there.
Part of this can be attributed to my ridiculously high expectations, which were humanly impossible to meet for any substantial amount of time, so when I would meet a guy that I liked, I would pursue him relentlessly, manipulate him into falling in love with me, expect him to buy me flowers daily and take me on exotic dates and refrain from doing the slightest thing that would make me uninterested, and break up with him anyway.
It was pathetic, and is a period of my life that I am totally ashamed of. This part of my life left me with a conclusion at nineteen years old: I am never going to have the ability to love someone unconditionally.
I gave alot of credit to my diagnosis of Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder, and left it at that. I don't know what my plan was, but in the depths of my heart I assumed I would just flutter from honeymoon period to honeymoon period, and bask in the glory of flowers and candy and thoughtful gifts and poems and absolute undying devotion that usually lasted around four months and in the long run left alot of people really messed up, including myself.
Then he happened.
And I dont give him all the credit for tethering my wild heart. In fact, most of the credit is due to the One who created my heart in the first place, guided it through my journey of looking for fulfillment in a million other places, patiently restructured my beliefs about what love is, and brought into my life a man who demanded to be loved unconditionally and who was able to keep my attention.
So, here we are. Almost three years later. Three years that have passed in a blink of an eye, and how was it so easy? I have been reflecting on this alot lately, and have come to very few conclusions. I think its safe to assume that the only way to explain how I have stayed faithfully and completely enamored with this man, is that he is the only man I was created to feel that way towards. That a combination of the way God has worked on my heart, and the exact mixture of the elements of Omars character and the way he playfully and intentionally holds my heart, and is not only the man of all of my wildest dreams, but is truly my very best friend, somehow completes the puzzle and breaks the cycle and naturally just works. I could do this for at least another three, or three thousand, years. Easily.