Romance - it's in the details

Husband doesn't go in for buying me flowers. Jewelry isn't his thing. Chocolates are something we get for a treat, not something we give as a present. If I want a romantic weekend away, I'd better book it.

Does that mean he's not romantic?

Nope.

He's spent the last ten days or so putting his CD collection onto his computer as MP4s. For me, this meant lots of 'yes dear' moments when he waxed lyrical about whichever CD he was copying. It also meant enduring the agony of 'The Rush Day'. Let us never speak of it again.

When he'd finished, on his last day off, I suggested he go for a walk, or go out, or do something for himself. "Nah," he said, "I've got a few music-y bits and pieces to finish off."

The next day, as I was about to leave for a weekend with my brother, he leant in through the window of the car and handed me a CD. "Here ya go. There's over a hundred tracks on here, for the journey."

"Thanks, love!" I said, thinking he'd just put a random sample of his collection onto CD for me.

I drove off.

I pressed play.

Every one of those tracks is a personal favourite, or a cherished memory, or somehow significant to me, or to us. All those times, in the (eeek!) twelve years we've been together, when I've gone, "Ooooh, I love this one," he REMEMBERED. The first tune I ever taped off the radio. The ones we laugh through together. The ones I write to. The embarassing ones I sing to, eyes screwed shut. The ones that are more about my relationship with my God, than my relationship with my Husband.

All the way down the motorway, each new track, I was yelling, "You GENIUS!" delightedly at the stereo. It was like he was sitting beside me, handing me little gifts.

Some of the tracks I didn't even know he HAD. Some of them he bought online for me.

I can buy myself flowers. Heck, I can buy myself diamonds. This... this kind of understanding I couldn't get anywhere else.

It's all in the details, folks. It's something I need to keep in mind for my heroes.