I regret buying a house *riiiight* at the peak of housing bubble.

I regret not going to Europe the summer before we started having kids.

I regret not discovering that I liked long-distance running until my late 20s. Maybe I could have been a cross-country runner in high school if I'd given it a chance.

I regret being 31 and not having finished a novel (yet).

I regret the too-many pieces of hot, buttery French bread I had at dinner last night.

You know what I don't regret?

Him.

There are many, many decisions in my life--major ones, some of them--when I look back and think, "Yeah, I really wish I would have done that differently, come to think about it."

But not marrying him.

We were young when we got married, for sure, but that doesn't bother me at all.

Yes, we still had a lot of growing up to do at age 21, but we did it together, figuring out life and love and each other side by side, as partners.

I've been furious with him, plenty of times. I've wished he weren't so ____ (fill in blank with whatever personality trait happens to be annoying me at the moment). But I've never, not once, looked at him and regretted this moment.



It was 10 years ago. I wish I could say that I remember that moment, the putting on of rings, the saying of the vows, but so much of that day is all a blur now.

What's not a blur?

Walking through a driving downpour together in the streets of Liverpool, England, on our honeymoon; completely drenched, completely happy.

Standing on top of a mountain in Montana and looking out toward the Rockies and feeling like we'd conquered the world.

The exhaustion on his face as he held my hand through the entire 18 hours of labor with our first baby.

Clinging to him as tight as I could, zipping around a windy road on the back of his motorcycle.

Sitting in a roadside Denny's at 2 a.m. to talk for hours about how we really, honestly thought our marriage was going.

It's the accumulation of all those little memories and more--the hard things, the sad things, the boring things, and going through them side by side--that's made us who we are now. On the one hand, I can't believe it's been 10 years. I don't feel 10 years older. On the other hand, when I think back to that summer of wedding planning, that seems like a different life ago. A different person ago.

I don't believe in fate, or destiny, or soulmates. But I'm thankful that it was him. Thankful to still have this guy next to me.

Not a great picture--but it's the most recent picture of the two of us together that I have, so it'll have to do. Clearly we need to start having the kids take pictures of us, and not just us take pictures of the kids.

Ten years. And the only thing I can think of to sum it up is this:

No regrets.