Love and Devotion
Love and Devotion
May I love you?
Your sweet lips are the sweetest of all. I love every inch of your heart, your mind, your soul. I love the ground you walk on, the air you breathe.
I am longing for you dear, longing to be able to whisper my true honest love into your own precious little ears.
I could tell you I love you once for every hair on your precious head, and then I would not have expressed one half the devotion I feel for you.
Obviously, I didn’t write that.
There aren’t any “maybe’s” in there.
The author of that piece was a young lady named Marguerite Fadeley, and it was written around 1907.
One of the cool things about buying and selling other people’s stuff is that sometimes you find a treasure buried in a box of junk.
A treasure that may not even have any monetary value to anyone, but a window to someone’s heart and soul, and therefore might even be priceless.
I wrote in my dad’s obituary, in the words of Nichole Spector, we are all stories:
“…the fact that in the end, we all become stories. Ashes to ashes and dust to dust, sure, but also: words to words.”
I don’t know much about Marguerite Fadeley.
But I am finding her words fascinating.
From what I could find:
She was born May 12, 1891.
She died at the young age of 59 on March 29, 1951.
She would have been about 16 or 17 when she wrote the words above, the first passage in her notebook dated 1907.
Apparently, she lived in Leesburg, Virginia and married William Carlton Whitmore in 1921 who was the Leesburg Virginia Postmaster.
She was survived by one son, William Carlton Jr. who also has since passed.
To the best of my knowledge this may be the first time her words have been published in any form for others to read.
Today is my 25th wedding anniversary.
And though I love every inch of Kim’s heart, her mind, and her soul; and I love the ground she walks on, the air she breathes, I don’t think I could have written those words to her.
Maybe.
But maybe not.
We have shared many joys, and we have faced many challenges.
Some of those challenges have been known to have destroyed many marriages.
Yet our relationship prevailed.
Got stronger even.
Oddly enough, finding Kim at that time in my life, I found some parallels in Marguerite’s words.
Like the first time I saw her:
Eyes have met,
Lips are not yet,
But oh, you kid,
I will get you yet
(Marguerite Fadeley)
And I did!
And now it is twenty-five years of marriage later.
And I am sure we will share many more joys, and face many more challenges…
but we will continue to do that together.
May I love you?
Thankfully, you said yes.
Happy Anniversary Kim!
