The great birthday flap of 2024 was resolved in Crankenstein’s favor last night, following another of her Houdini-like marital escapes. She returned home at the end of a long and trying day bearing a self-deprecating card, a cake, and a sestina previously written for me. Even for a committed grouch such as myself, it’s hard to nurture a grievance against a partner who frames your dumpster-fire marriage as eloquently as this*:
At the year's thin end, Nestled in the circle of the longest night Lies the unbreakable promise Slumbering seed-quiet in the earth, Awaiting the return of light, of fire. The new is waiting even at the close.
Or:
There is no promise Nestled so dangerously close To lying as the thought that earth Needs us somehow, and will end When we do. There is no eternal night In whirling galaxies—only empty space, and fire.
It concludes, in part, “Love is no dearer when paid in pain, I promise” and “What is held close may change but does not end.” She says more in those two lines than others might know, and more in the latter than she may realize herself. Her gimlet eye is one of her most attractive qualities, even if I sometimes question whether she sees herself as clearly as she does the rest of the world.
I harbor no illusions that I’m a spectacular spouse (it’s not as if I’d marry me), but figured the anniversary of my birth was worth, at the minimum, a homemade card or dessert. Crankenstein’s belated gesture meets or exceeds those expectations, so the court considers the matter settled and finds that I’m not to hold this against her in the future — unless she reoffends. Bailiff Byrd will now escort the cake to the kitchen so we may shove some in our faces.
* Lest that be misinterpreted as a swipe, we mutually joke about our marriage. Our gallows humor is probably clearer if you’ve heard the Crankcasts we’ve done together than it is from my one-sided posts. On the subject of Crankcasts, I’d taken a holiday break, and then there was basement jackhammering, and then I was sick and sounded like a Sudafed commercial for two weeks. Now that I can breathe again, I’ll find something to yap about soon.