Lucky in Love

Yep, I'm gonna do it. It's Valentine's week (one of my favorite weeks all year), so this means I get to write about love.

I understand a LOT of people HATE Valentine's day. I feel like too many people have given into mass marketing and media by allowing their view of Valentine's day to be only for those in some kind of romantic relationship. Yes, it is a PERFECT day to celebrate your romance, but it's also a GREAT day to celebrate all the other people who are in your life. And please don't tell me you should do that every day. Yes, you should. But does that mean we stop celebrating Thanksgiving because we should be grateful for all we have every day? Well, we SHOULD be grateful and thankful every day, but it is nice to have one day out of the year to celebrate and focus on all our blessings.

Okay, I'm off my soapbox. Now it's time to start the week of love by telling you about one of my loves.

He's gonna kill me for this...but his name is Brad and he's so wonderful. We met last summer at summer camp (how cliche is that???). Don't worry, we weren't campers OR counselors (not nearly "Wet, Hot American Summer"). I was bouncing around with dating and semi-legit relationships after having ended a 7 yr long relationship. To be honest, I'm not even sure what "semi-legit" means, I just know they weren't anything real or long-term. I knew I wanted something, but wasn't sure what. Anyway, I went to this camp as the summer photographer mainly so I could get away from real life. Turns out I met Brad and...well, now we've been together for 8 fabulous months. 

He lives about 9 hours away (that's the problem with meeting at camp). But, we make it work by seeing each other as often as possible (sometimes once a month) and talking on the phone daily. I write him letters, he reads the letters! Haha! He's not much of a letter writer, but I don't really mind. 

The main reasons I love him are:

1.) He makes me laugh. I LOVE to laugh, and I'm constantly laughing with (and at) him!

2.) He actually listens to what I say and remembers (most of) it! Even the non-important things.

3.) He genuinely wants me to be happy. It's so obvious and so sweet.

4.) He doesn't always agree with me and he's really good at having a mature disagreement.

5.) He's nice. So very, very nice. (This may seem silly, but I've been in some relationships where the guys just weren't that nice to me. I didn't realize it at the time, but that was one of the first things I noticed about him-how nice and polite he was.)

Sometimes you have to look at the bright side of things. See, at first I was all sad because he wouldn't be here on Valentine's Day OR my birthday. But, the good thing about it is, he'll get here on Friday, which means I get to extend this week all the way through the weekend. 

That's enough about Brad. I'll tell you about some other people as the week continues.

Just in case you're wondering, yes, I did the double cardio work-out today. I was really tired/sore from lifting weights at the gym yesterday. It affected some of the cardio that involves arm movement, but overall I'm pretty satisfied with the work-out. During my walk I found some pretty decent places to do some cross-country style sprints, so that'll be good for later in the week and next week.

Until tomorrow....