Time together rekindles old flame

A few days ago, we returned from our vacation slightly sunburned, totally exhausted, reeking of sun block, and giggling like teenagers.

This week long trip I took with my husband was possibly one of the best things we have ever done.

My husband and I had not had much of an opportunity to spend time alone in years. He’d had a year in Korea that left me alone in Alaska with a loud new infant that was immediately followed by his spending 15 months in Iraq, leaving me alone in Alaska with a loud toddler and the loud toddler’s new loud baby sister.

Suffice it to say, I now speak very loudly myself in order to be overheard in the cacophony that is my house.

So when my husband surprised me by announcing just the two of us were going to Mexico a few months ago, I was thrilled and flabbergasted and honestly a little nervous. I truly wondered what on earth we were possibly going to find to talk about when we were alone together that didn’t involve potty training, stain removal, pre-school or middle school cheerleading/ volleyball/ slumber parties.

I worried needlessly.

From the beginning of our trip, it was like our first date all over again. We laughed softly together and held hands everywhere we went and talked about our dreams and our hopes and potty training and stain removal and middle school activities.

So, not quite like our first date. Some things have changed dramatically since then, but for the better, we both agreed.

This trip offered us the opportunity to rediscover each other outside of the mad house of our children’s activities and sub zero Alaskan temperatures.

It was such a relief to admit to him all the worries that had infused me while he’d been deployed, and how the thought that we might never again be able to do just exactly what we were doing that kept me awake countless nights.

I knew so many soldiers never made it home, never got to spend another night with their families. All I could think about, as we slow danced in each other’s arms or walked together along the beach, was how I was one of the lucky ones.

A week was the perfect amount of time for our vacation: Long enough for us to fall in love all over again and realize just how much we miss our children while we are gone, but not quite long enough for my mother-in-law to Fed Ex them to a local orphanage.

When we got home this week, it was to weather 65 degrees warmer than when we left. Yeah, it was –25 when the plane took us away and imagine our shock at finding it 40 degrees when we got home. Not that either one of us is complaining, mind you.

All three kids were happy to see us, although I think the almost two-year old baby would have like another few days to ensure her enchantment over her Nana was complete. She had nothing to worry about, her grandmother was actually begging to change her smelly diapers and has even taught her a song and dance to go along with it.

It’s no wonder I married into this family, I appear sane next to most of them.

So my husband and I are now firmly back in the grip of the reality of our lives, taking kids to school, picking them up from swimming and gymnastics and volleyball, and every now and then remembering some ridiculous tidbit from our trip and laughing together at stories only we know about.

And if you get the chance, ask me about the night in Cabo San Lucas when I tackled a six-foot Elmo on-stage in front of several hundred people. That’s a great story. And I’ll tell it in the middle of stories about potty training and stain removal and middle school activities.

Tiffany Horvath is the mother of two and the stepmother of one. Her husband, Drew, was deployed to Iraq and returned home in December. She writes every Sunday abut life at home as a wife and mother.