Just like that, we'd done eight years together. It's no secret, especially amongst close friends of mine, that the last thing I thought I'd be successful in is marriage, because of my very nature, which more often than not, tends so much to the self, and that's me trying to avoid saying I'm selfish. From being the last thing I thought to be successful in, to being the only thing I've been successful in thus far, if the weighing of other aggregates of my life are anything to go by. Life can be such a mystery to unravel. Ah!


I only started believing that we might make a success of this, after our first Sabbath year, twelve months ago. It looked like if we had managed those seven years with our heads still on our necks, and we could still speak each other's names without revulsion, even a tinge of it, then we can take this down the whole hog, maybe even a lifetime, make this a true "till death do us part" story. No? Only time will tell they say, but from where I stand, this is beginning to look like it is for the long haul.


They say marriage isn't a bed of roses, we knew that, only that we didn't envisage it can also be a bed of thorns. Like the roses simply withered away and left the thorns, but only with someone like you, could a bed of thorns be so good to lie on, as you'd do with acupuncture needles allover you. The experience has been exhilaratingly fascinating, to say the least. The bitterness we experience, can only be explained with what happens when one tastes a bottle of finely brewed barley and hops in Guinness Stout, that distinctive bitter taste that the taste buds respond to by giving the taste centre in the brain, a sweet sensation that sets the cells of the body off into a titillating dance, that only connoisseurs of the brand can absolutely relate and attest to.


In eight years, we have laughed and cried, we've fasted and had our fill, we thirsted for and also got drunk, we went naked and also clothed ourselves in embroidery, we lost heavily and won stupendously, we drifted apart and then got so close we could've smothered ourselves while holding each other in a tight embrace, we strayed and found our ways back, we looked different and then found the resemblance between us growing, we worked hard and played harder, planned and destroyed our plan, we didn't know each other's thoughts but now we finish each other's sentences; there was no midline or lukewarm with us, we were either vaporizing or freezing. Now, we can't even be angry enough to raise our voice against each other, that's how far we've evolved, my sweet one.


If the so called missing rib was the reason a man would've had to cling unto a woman, I can say that mine was in you. Sometimes I fear that we might have reached our peak, and seeing nothing else to discover about each other, decide to end it, but you said the possibility of that wasn't farfetched, but that the snag will be that the new people in our lives will have to tolerate us cheating on them, and I couldn't agree more with you. A year after the Sabbath, with all that we've done in it, encourages me that we could meet another Sabbath year together, if we are fortunate to be blessed with the gift of life.


My only regrets is that I have to work today, I'd gotten so engrossed in things so much, that unlike the years before now, I hadn't planned my schedule to accommodate this day, but like the understanding being that I've gotten used to over the past fourteen years, you've organized the day into a work play for me, such that I could trudge hard in the day, and spend the best part of it with you, later in the play that will ensue, the details of which is still unknown to me. That's why I like you, the spontaneity of our love, how we can work with about any situation, how there's no taboo, no limit, no excess, no shortage, no end, no obstructions, no breach; just opportunities, light in the obscure, lemonade from lemons, peace even in the midst of conflict, confidence in the midst of uncertainty. Thank you Eni, for The Eighth.


Na me,
'kovich


PICTURE CREDIT
- https://images.app.


THE EIGHTH https://madukovich./2019/08/05/the-eighth/