So the “They” that decide these things say 11 years of marriage is the steel anniversary. Ok. I’ll play. A gift made from steel, gotta be a ton of options for that. Putting aside the fact of course that my wife is the hardest person to buy gifts for, getting the right steel gift should be a snap.

Or should it?

When racking my brain to come up with such a gift a title for this post came to me – Steel Magnolia. Perfect actually. It describes Tracy to a T. See what I did there?

A Steel Magnolia is an apt description. The Magnolia is a strong flower, beautiful in sight but also in design. The flower evolved primarily to foster the bee population. To that end the core of the flower is unlike any other. Not the normal petal and sepal set up on most flowers, the Magnolia’s bud is protected by a bract. So says wikipedia.

Beautiful, tough, created for a purpose, and not the normal set up…  yeah that’s describing my wife to a T. So the Steel Magnolia thing just flowed easily from that. But I still needed a steel gift. Ponder that as you peep pics of Tracy through our 11 year journey.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

As I glance into the kitchen while I type this I see my wife of 11 years dangling a piece of cinnamon bread over Frank’s head in an effort to get him to dance with her to her hip hop music. 11 years takes a toll people. Drastic times calls for drastic measures.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

So that’s it. 11 years in 11 pictures. But what gift to get that aligns with the steel anniversary?

Let me rephrase. What to get the girl who is impossible to shop for that aligns with the steel anniversary? Of course the New York trip was really the gift. And it was a good one. Plenty of steel in that city. But as you may or may not know, Jimmy Fallon called the whole thing off, leaving me holding the gift bag as it were. All because he had a kid on Wednesday. Wimp.

Undaunted, I pressed on. I had to get on the edge of gift buying. Something so out there scrutinizing it would be a waste of time. Something impervious to the scrutiny of an impossible gift getter. And it had to be steel.

By the way, my new life goal is to find the people who decide these ridiculous things and knock their chicklets down their throats.

Anyway it finally hit me. Free from scrutiny, the appropriate metal, and a damn fine idea if I do say so myself. And I do say so.

An integral part in the grieving of our lost soul Linda Claire was making sure she remained part of our family story. A very grainy picture of her at the moment of birth is really all we have, remembrance wise.

So I thought what better way to make her a permanent part of our family story than submitting her name to the national star registry – naming a star after her. A tad on the corny side, but still cool enough. So somewhere in the heavens is a binary star, two stars from the same celestial body, in other words twin stars, composed of all sorts of metal including STEEL!  The stars now have the names Linda Claire and Anne Marie and the inscription, Sisters…cum in aeterno in aeternum.  (together forever in eternity).

Yeah corny. I know. Happy Anniversary dear!

We’ll always have New York.