Rabbit Write

retouched photo thanks to the talented Oliver Thomas of Scene-There

I wore this princess flowy gown recently for mine and Ned’s 6 month wedding anniversary/2 year dating anniversary. Since the 6 month/2 year anniversary collision only happens once, I was bent on celebrating big.

I was quick to come up with ideas: we could make sushi together at home, oohh and make it into an all-day date by beginning with dim sum for brunch then going to museums. Or we could have a fabulous picnic at the Alfred Caldwell lillypool. Yet every idea I got all sparkly eyed about, Ned only gave a half-hearted “sure.” Finally, I asked him why he wasn’t excited. “Do you not want to celebrate” I asked. “No that’s not it…I do want to celebrate of course, but I just get nervous about planning these big dates.” he said ” Every time we plan something…it goes wrong. You remember what happened last Valentines Day.”

I winced, remembering all too well. Last Valentines Day I had decided that we would have a romantic quiet evening at home. We would stay in and listen to Northern Soul and have a lovely meal. I decided on the menu ahead of time. Champagne and caviar to begin and for the entree: roast duck with beets vinaigrette and wild rice. Chocolate truffles for dessert.  I thought this menu would be perfect, we could mingle with our champagne and caviar while the duck and beets roasted, it would be a fairly low maintenance dinner to put together.

I didn’t realize that duck would be so hard to find the week of Valentines Day. The duck we ended up finding came from a small butcher who showed Ned a backroom of live caged ducks, as I ran out of the store gagging.

After I ran out of the store,  Ned followed about 10 minutes later. Still in shock, I asked if he got a duck. “Yes” he responded…”Was it alive?” I began to lose it, Ned had picked out a duck, looked into it’s eyes and told the man to kill it!? Ned assured me this was a much more connected, humane way to get our meat. We saw the animal and it seemed healthy, we know exactly where it had come from, unlike meat from grocery stores. Feeling somewhat soothed by this I decided it was okay.

Opening the bag, Ned told me he would take care of the duck. When I went to check on the beets, his skin was a sickly pale-white-purple. He looked awful, but swore everything was fine. The duck was in the oven so we settled in with our champagne.

As we connected he finally told me what was wrong. “The duck still had it’s head on…I had to cut it off.”

When the duck came out of the oven 15 minutes later, neither of us could eat a bite.

The sad thing was, we both knew this could have been stopped, had we been honest. Had I not run out of the store alone, but stopped and told Ned what I felt, or had Ned told me that the duck’s head was on and what he felt we could have saved ourselves this whole travesty. Yet we were each so worried about ruining the special night that we didn’t do anything. We always strive to be honest and vulnerable but in this situation, we let it slip. It would serve as an important lesson for always practicing honesty and being in the moment.

So when Ned brought this up, it reminded me that we need to continually check in with each other and be honest during a big day. But also this time maybe we should plan something a bit more stress-free. So I told Ned to make dinner reservations somewhere.

This anniversary turned out spectacular. We went to Between, a restaurant/lounge where we sat in a private area hidden by stringed-red curtains. We curled up on a comfy couch whispering sweet things to each other and sharing lots of slow kisses. I had the best champagne cocktail, with gin and elderberry liquor. We ate smoked-salmon sweet potato puffs, ahi tuna flatbread and roasted duck with potatoes- which we were able to thoroughly enjoy. The creme brulee trio and blue cheese cheesecake weren’t bad either.

More importantly, we stayed honest, connected and vulnerable the entire time, while engaging in ultra-romance, which give a real rush and is what truly makes for a good anniversary.

What good or bad anniversary experiences have you had?

Subscribe to my blog!
Subscribe to my podcast!
Subscribe to my newsletter!

Related posts:

1. An outfit fit for a mad tea-party
2. Good People, Bad People + Dropping Defenses
3. Exploring What Intimacy Means
4. Red Lips/Leather and How did you Meet?
5. Belated Birthday Extravaganza Post