Aside from myself (and our children), I know you better than any other soul on this planet.  I know your fears, your faults, all the wonderful things about you that keep me falling in Love with you over and over again – even after all these years.

There is a great irony; that you, my “atheist” husband, give and restore my faith and hope in so many magical and inexplicable things.

I can honestly say, that you – despite all your failings, and all our fights and all the mistakes we’ve both made, rekindle my belief in God, Love, Immortality and maybe even in Superpowers.

Your kindness.

Your humility.

Your calm and logical approach to even the most complicated and terrifying situations.

Your intelligence.

Your ability to do maths!  To a brain like mine, that’s bordering on mysticism.

These are your just some of your super-powers.

And when combined with my super-human capacity to be a bossy miss fix-it, and desire to save the world one person or cause at a time, we have made a fairly formidable team.

You give me the strength and resources to busily go about attempting to change the world in big ways and in small.  You support me in every single effort – even those that you know are destined to failure because I often lack your ability to think or plan things out or think logically and plainly about “details” or “consequences”.

Living our lives the way we do has, at times, made either one or both of us very vulnerable.  Trying to make a difference in this world and in the lives of others leaves us wide open to scrutiny, and at times, the alterior motives and agendas of some less than forthright or ethical people.  And sometimes I get tired.  Because I wonder if all of our trials and efforts are in vain.

But then, every night, I lay down next to you.

Sometimes we even talk (other times we just DM or facebook…) and when we talk, we talk about our friendships and our family, and we talk about so much that is wrong with the world and so much that is right… And how unbelievably lucky we are to have eachother, and what we can do next to make the world a little better.

Somehow, we have earned the Love and respect of good people who are fighting just as hard as we are to make a difference where and how they can.  And no matter what gets thrown at us, or who or what breaks our hearts – we keep on living this crazy, busy, geographically diverse, and amazing life together.  Striving for the same things and enjoying so many adventures as we do.

Today, as we stand here in front of so many of our friends and family to affirm the vows we made more than a decade ago – I want to thank you – openly and publicly and with all my heart for being the absolutely amazing force for good in mine, and so many others’ lives.

Believing, as we both do, in some sort of karmic balance that can positively affect the world around us the good in our hearts and actions, or teach us what we need to learn –  I wonder what on earth I could have ever done to deserve a Love like ours.

Despite all my faults, the emotional rollercoaster I seem to constantly be riding, all of my many mistakes, and my occasional but impressive proclivity to fly completely off the handle – you stand firmly by me.

You make me feel like the most beautiful woman in the world.  You patiently wait for my dark days and depressive episodes to pass.  You take my hand and share in the euphoric highs that I sometimes get to enjoy.

You are helping me every day to raise three (and soon four) of the most amazing little humans I have ever met.

I know I nag you sometimes, but you are the most wonderful father and role model and we are all so blessed to have you.

I could go on for hours, or even days about just how much I Love and appreciate you and all the reasons why.

I’ll wrap this up with a couple of facts about our journey, because I think it is really important that people know that happily ever after takes a phenomenal amount of work.

Because we’re pretty much an open book and live our lives out loud (or I do and you kinda have to follow my lead) there’s no secret that we’ve both done some epically dumb stuff over the years.

We’ve had some fights that one or both of us thought might have been the end of our relationship – but somehow, we both choose to fight for our Love and keep standing together – till death do us part.

Being married and sharing this life means choosing each other, in the face of temptation, boredom, adversity, doubt, and even anger and regret.  Through the many changes we have gone through as individuals and as a couple – we have been strengthened by the trials that threatened to tear us apart.

The reward for these efforts cannot be reasonably elucidated, even with my extensive vocabulary and propensity for prose!

The reward is waking up nearly every single morning to a warm and familiar set of arms.  The reward is having someone to share every trial and triumph with.  The reward is a kind of immortality that comes from not just creating the lives of our children, but gently encouraging them to be the funny, moral, kind, caring and responsible people that we are both so proud to watch them become.

We are two halves of something whole.  I don’t make any sense without you and I think your light shines a bit brighter with me by your side.

Like you always say:

Neither of us is anywhere close to perfect, but we are absolutely perfect together.

Thank you for the last ten years. And I can’t wait to get on with the rest of our lives, and I’d hazard an unquantifiable guess, the rest of eternity with you.