I still remember the night that I met him.

He was with his friends, people I knew vaguely and fallen in with that night by happenstance.  It was his friend Kai who told him to walk me home.  On Sunday he held me close in a goodbye hug, my head tucked in the hollow of his neck.  I told him he could keep me. 

He called when he said he would.  Despite the distance between us physically, he made very clear his desire to be close to me.  He understood something that nearly every man before him could never grasp – that to a woman with a strong and independent spirit, the ability to help her without making her feel helpless is the true measure of a hero. The night before I drove down to North Carolina to see him again, we had a phone conversation that lasted so far into the night that we ran out of things to say.  And yet we stayed on the phone anyway, listening to each other breathe, being as close as we could under the circumstances.  After we hung up, he called me back to tell me he loved me.

I remember when I called the priest to ask him to marry us.  “Tell me about him,” was Father Dimitrios’s first response. 

“He’s the most honorable man I have ever known.”  That was my first response, the preamble to the laundry list of praises that would follow.  That I should begin that way impressed Father. 

But it’s true.  My man gives up his seat on the subway for pregnant ladies and old people, without thinking twice or hesitating.  There is not a child or animal that encounters him that does not innately trust him.  If there is a task to be done, someone who needs assistance, he will quietly step in and help shoulder the load.  And if you try to do more than offer a simple thank you to show your gratitude, he will be a little embarrassed. To him, it was no more than what he ought to be doing.

He took my heart in hand, and loved it with warmth and caring and constancy.  It keeps me grounded to this day, this amazing depth of love.  Kept me grounded even as I prepared for this moment:

A friend of mine who came to my wedding was struck by something I said during my toast to my new husband at the reception.  There is nothing more important I could do in this life than be by your side…the fact is, it’s still true.