Invitations from the past

Chicago in the winter -- from zachanderson.com

It was lunchtime. I was browsing the Chicago Craigslist, drooling over the large beautiful apartments that could be had for much less than what the Ukrainian and I are paying for our 1 BR in San Franciso’s Noe Valley. The day before, I had calculated that Chicago has a 26% lower cost of living than the Bay Area, but only a 11% lower average salary rate. It is also significantly closer to my family in Iowa and only a 2 hour flight to friends in New York or family in Washington, D.C.

These are the thoughts that cross my mind when the Ukrainian and I talk about having a baby in such dismal economic times. A baby is something I really want, but I worry about how we will manage it all on our combined income — while not impoverished in the slightest, is very definitely middle class — when housing and childcare are both not only so expensive here, but also extremely difficult to find.

While browsing Craigslist, I was also listening to Alice 97.3 on ITunes Radio. The Smashing Pumpkins’ song “Tonight, Tonight” came on. I listened to the lyrics, waiting for the lines: and the embers never fade in your city by the lake the place where you were born. The city by the lake is Chicago. The place where I was born — well, really, it’s the suburbs of Chicago. But still…everytime I heard this song, it takes me back to the life I had before I first moved to California. Could it be a sign, I wondered, to hear this song while browsing the Chicago Craigslist? I dismissed the thought. Signs had not done much for me in the past.

I checked my email to get away from all thoughts of returning to the Windy City. I have a good job here and the Ukrainian is establishing his life here. It would be asinine to shake things up. And there, in my email, was a little mini-shake-up.

“We’ve received an invitation from E to his Halloween party on Saturday,” I IM the Ukrainian.

“Who’s E? Your ex-boyfriend?”

“Yeah…” E and I met in the midst of the breakup with the Bulgarian. We dated in the months I spent preparing to move to the Netherlands. We broke up while I was there. Got back together in a much more tentative way after I returned to San Francisco and then broke up once again in the spring of 2007. It was the demise — or rather never-success — of this relationship that made me post the ad on Craigslist to which the Ukrainian responded. While E and I never call each other up to say “How’re you doing?” we do end up on each other’s party invite list. I’m never sure why.

“So what do you think?” I asked the Ukrainian. I never mind a good house party (they’re much preferable to clubs these days, now that I’m in my 30s and married), but was there the need to keep putting my husband in the awkward spot of being paraded around in front of my exes? Besides, I have now learned from E’s last party — the first held since we were married — that the more interesting male guests no longer pay attention to me. It’s the ring on my 4th finger. It’s the husband whose eyes my eyes meet from across the room every 30 seconds or so. If the men are single, they have little to gain from much conversation with me. And if they’re not, it will only be moments before their significant other will find away to interrupt the conversation. It is moments like these I despise the more puritanical twists of American culture. Europe always seemed more relaxed. Indeed, at the dinner parties I attended there, significant others were always seated apart to shake things up a little. It was a chance to talk to someone besides the one person you talk to everyday.

I.E. in a bikini

“Well, I have to meet up with I.E. this weekend. She is in town for the weekend. But I have to be at a conference all day Saturday and I have a midterm due Tuesday.” Oh right. I.E. His childhood friend from his hometown in eastern Ukraine who now lives in Chicago. My inner puritan woke up started flashing:  red light! red light!! Where had I heard this story before? Oh right, the Bulgarian whose ex-girlfriend from Bulgaria so innocently reinserted herself into his life, apartment, and then bed. I needed more information about this I.E.

“Do you have a picture of her?” I IMed the Ukrainian.

“Check your email,” he responded after a moment’s pause.

And there it was. Right there in my email:  a picture of a beautiful, blond Russian woman in a bikini. She was the sort of Slavic beauty that so many American men fantasize about when they visit sites like russianwomen.com.

“Mr. Ukrainian, she’s hot!” I ferociously panicked-IM the Ukrainian. My mind raced back over the few slightly-heated discussions we’d had over the past few days about a few key issues regarding the future. Now was not the time for him to be finding solace in his childhood chum who happened to look like a swimsuit model. And who was she anyway to be sending my husband pictures of herself in a bikini?! Damn these East European women! They are so clever. These were not the sort of social skills we learned back in rural Iowa. My mind recalled the model-like build of the Bulgarian ex-girlfriend. Not again! I thought.

“Check your email again.” The Ukrainian wrote over IM.

I went back to my Google mail. And there is was. A snapshot of a nice-enough looking woman standing on a bridge in the night wearing a formal (bridesmaid?) gown. She was attractive enough, but so very much not the Ukrainian’s type. I relaxed with relief. And then I started laughing. My, did the Ukrainian know how to rile me up. He knew exactly what he was doing when he sent that swimsuit picture.

“Assehole!” I IMed back. He knew I was joking too.

Now that the threat was gone. I became more truly curious about this woman who came from where my husband comes from and now lives where I came from. Maybe, just maybe, I thought. She could be a key to get us back to where I though I might want to really be.

“So what does she do?” I asked.

“She’s a commercial financial analyst.”

My eyebrows raised. I didn’t need to write anything on the IM. The Ukrainian could hear my thoughts.

“Don’t worry,” he continued. “After I graduate and get more experience at my company, I will apply to hers too.”

Maybe there are signs. Maybe we will be in SF forever. Maybe a year from now, we will find ourselves in Chicago. Maybe life will take us yet elsewhere. But suddenly, all the crushing weight I was feeling about how to manage having a baby in SF lifted just a little. There just might be other options. The world and our future didn’t seem so locked in.

Green Card Timeline

As I mentioned yesterday, the Ukrainian received his Green Card. Yay! It only took 5 months and 18 days from the submision of our application and the receipt the of the Green Card. Entire time line of the Ukrainian’s progress to becoming an American is below!

16-Apr-2007     The Ukrainian arrives in San Francisco from Kiev.

??-May-2007      The Ukrainian responds to my Craigslist W4M ad.

08-Jun-2007     The Ukrainian and I meet in person at Tlaloc in San Francisco’s Financial District.

01-Sep-2007    The Ukrainian moves into my apartment in San Francisco’s Noe Valley.

16-Feb-2008    The Ukrainian proposed to me on Pacific Beach in San Diego with a ring from Tiffany’s.

19-Mar-2008    The Ukrainian and I are married in San Francisco’s city hall with 4 friends as witnesses.

09-May-2008    The Ukrainian and I submit our application to the USCIS (INS) for his green card.

June-2008         USCIS tells us that it does not have a copy of the Ukrainian’s birth certificate. We resubmit.

28-Jul-2008      The Ukrainian’s travel parole and work authorization permit arrive in the mail.

Aug-2008          We receive our letter inviting us to our green card interview for 19-SEP-2008

Aug-2008          We receive a letter canceling our 19-SEP-2008 green card interview with no explanation.

Aug-2008.         The Ukrainian visits the USCIS. Discovers it has our address recorded as Brooklyn. Fixes it.

Sep-2008           We receive a new letter inviting us to a new green card interview for 16-OCT-2008.

16-Oct-2008     Green Card interview.

23-Oct-2008     Receive a “Welcome to the United States of America” letter from Dept. of Homeland Security.

27-Oct-2008     Receive the greencard. Yay!

Oct-2010           Must renew Green Card.

Oct-2011           The Ukrainian is eligible for U.S. Citizenship.

As you can see from the timeline above, it only took us 5 1/2 months from the submission of our application for the green card to actually receiving it. It was only 2 1/2 months from the submission of our application until the Ukrainian received his work permit and travel parole. This is much, much better than many other countries. I’ve had friends and relatives who’ve gone through the same process and had to wait 1 1/2 years to be able to work. And *then* they have to take an integration course for a year.

Uncle Sam is not so bad for most people.

I think it helped that the Ukrainian has a PhD from his home country and is pursuing an MBA. Plus, honestly, I think the U.S. would like to see Ukraine be more Western/European leaning rather than Russian-leaning. Anything to make the U.S. look better to Ukrainians has to be a factor in our quick success.

Green Card Arrived!!!

Last week, the Ukraian received a letter from the Department of Homeland Security stating “Welcome to the United States of America — your greencard will arrive shortly.”

Yesterday, the Greencard arrived! Yay!

I kept thinking that once the card itself arrived, I would kick it into high gear and organize a big green card party complete with a DJ and everything green. But now we are almost to the U.S. holiday season. We have Halloween celebrations to attend this weekend. On the next weekend, Russian/German friends of ours are hosting a post-election party, and then we we are going to the Midwest to see my sister’s new baby and my brother’s family. And then it’s Thanksgiving and then can we really throw a green card party in the midst of the Christmas and Hannukah festivities?

And, also in December, the Ukrainian will graduate with his MBA in Finance. It will be another something wonderful to celebrate — perhaps making the green card celebration feel sooooo last month.

I know I promised some of you that I’d write up the greencard interview itself. I’m sorry I haven’t, although I’ve made a start. To be truthful, it was not the most pleasant experience and it really hurts my head to relive it.

But I will say this:  from our experience (and that of a few others we know) it seems that the U.S. Government is really tough when you are trying to gain entrance to the country, but once you’re in, the government is actually super nice — it’s been a much more positive experience for the Ukrainian than I had living in the Netherlands.

*Disclaimer. I know that the guantanamo and other situations do not reflect so well on the U.S. government. Hence the use of the words “in general”.

Playing with the blog

I had a lot of evil work to do tonight for my job, so of course I spent a lot of time procrastinating. Hence, the new layout. I don’t like it quite as well as the old one, but the old one didn’t have so many widgets to play with. Now you can see I added my twitter account and my old flickr account (couldn’t figure out how to hook in Picasa). I will do my greatest effort to start putting new photos on Flickr so you can see them here. For now, all the photos stop at mid-winter. Anyone who knows me in person has seen them all before.

I know, I know. There have been questions about what the actual green card interview was like. I will post that when I’m not busy procrastinating in other ways. One of my colleagues is being sponsored by her husband to change from H-1B to a greencard. I think I scared her with my description. Sorry colleague.  But really, it’s better to be prepared. I’ve heard of yet another friend of a friend who’s had to go through the whole “separate room” ordeal.

Testing feeds

This is just a test for some various feeds. Ignore this.

Role Reversal: The morning of the Green Card Interview

On Thursday morning, I met the Ukrainian downtown at his office on Montgomery St., lugging my 200 photos and cheap white photo album from Walgreens in my luxe black leather Coach tote that the Ukrainian had given me the previous March in honor of International Women’s Day. I had on my knee high black patent leather boots — also from Coach, the ones that made unknown women stop me on the street exclaiming, “Where did you get those boots?!” and men look me up and down with a whistle. For the main piece, I wore the same Tory Burch long sleeve shift dress that Britney Spears wore on probably the only classy trial day she ever had. Economy be damned. If ever there was day to be a label-whore, this day was it. I didn’t want to show up at the INS looking like some slovenly student that the Ukrainian had to pay to get her to marry him.

For his part, the Ukrainian played the role of the successful young businessman very well. He wore his Hugo Boss suit with a navy-blue striped Hugo Boss tie. His shoes were Calvin Klein. His black leather satchel:  Kenneth Cole. Sadly, neither of his Hugo Boss shirts were clean so he had to settle for Zara. But it was fine, what he lacked in labels, he made up for in fit and class. The Zara shirt was made for his tall, lean body and had French Cuffs! This touch of sophisticated flair was certain to impress any INS bureaucrat, I was sure.

So I met the Ukrainian at his office where I could deposit my iPhone, camera, and 2nd cellphone (long story why I carry around 2 phones — it’s a temporary situation). While he finished up a few last minute business-related calls, I went to work on organizing our 200+ photos into the cheap white album I had purchased the night before.

“You’re crazy,” the Ukrainian told me again and again between each phone call as I tried to sort the photos into chronological order while stuffing them into the cheap plastic album slots.

“Get me some paper clips. They’re not all in order. We’ll clip the ones that aren’t in order to the pages they should be in.” My engineer’s mind couldn’t function without everything in life being absolutely sequential and “in order”. But I also knew that looking well put together — not just in clothes — but in the “evidence” we brought with us to our interview would be important to impressing our interviewer, and hopefully save us the troubles that so many other couples have endured.

Soon, it was 10 minutes until our interview. There was no more time for business phone calls. No more time to organize our photos to best show our story. It was time to walk to the INS offices.

And that’s when I realized:  I hadn’t eaten. Not that morning. Not more than 2 nibbles of lettuce the night before. And I was hungry. Whatever nerves I had vanished. My stomach rumbled. The Ukrainian laughed. “I feel sorry for whoever interviews us. He better be nice to you because he won’t be able to kick you out of the country for being mean!” The bitchiness that I exude when hungry is famous. All I have to do is say the word “hungry” and the Ukrainian is on his feet offering to fetch me whatever food I desire. He’d rather exercise this small moment of servitude than suffer the wrath of my mood on an empty stomach. But on this day, he was having none of it.

“There is no time to eat. Or to stop for a candy or fruit. Here, just for you, I have a piece of gum.” I reluctantly took the gum from the Ukrainian while looking across the street at a deli. I could just run in…get something…anything…just one thing that would save me if we’re taken into separate rooms and questioned for hours on end with out so much as a cup of water or a bite to eat. Clearly, I’d been watching too communist-themed espionage and subversion films. But I could tell that this was one moment the Ukrainian did not want to be challenged. The moment was simply too important.

And so in my fancy clothes, I dragged my hungry belly, bundle of nerves, and cheap white wedding photo album into the non-descript government building on Sacramento St. and through security. Though I would not have even been there if it wasn’t for the Ukrainian, I was especially glad to have him there. The nerves and lack of food made me light-headed and a bit faint. I no longer knew where we were supposed to be going or what we were supposed to do once we got there. I took the Ukrainian’s arm for support and let him guide me through the halls he had negotiated so many times before since arriving in the States.

Suddenly, in my own native country, I felt myself to be the foreigner.

Our brown dog: Bigga than Ben

I had heard about the dark comedy Bigga than Ben taking the UK’s film festivals by a storm and playing at a few cinemas in Moscow. So, this morning, I got online to check it out. The Ukrainian was in the kitchen preparing his breakfast. I call him over to watch the trailer.

Yes, it’s about 2 common low-life Russian thieves in living in London illegally. The Ukrainian was not impressed — he prefers the world of more glamorous thieves as depicted in the likes of Eastern Promises.

But…he should have paid more attention to the thieves’ tactics. For when he returned to the kitchen to eat his breakfast, he found half of it missing.
“Anna! You thief! You asshole!!” He yelled at the brown dog.
“Michelle! Look at what the brown dog did!” He brought the evidence of the 1/2 missing breakfast out to the living room. I shrugged my shoulders. What could I do? He was the one who left a very prized plate of chicken, vegetables, pasta and apple pie out unguarded.
“Come here, Annochka,” I called the brown dog over using the Russian diminutive of her name. “Who’s my good Russian doggie?”
“You know,” I then responded to the Ukrainian with a wink and a sly grin, “When you live with Russians, you become like Russians.”

Nerves: Green Card interview

I didn’t think I would be so nervous about our green card interview. Anyone who has ever seen the Ukrainian and I together know how much we love each other. Indeed, this blog is almost an on-going testament to our love rather than its original purpose: charting my course in trying to learn the Russian language. But then, late last night, we had a mad-dash to get our wedding photos printed. We walked from the Noe Walgreens to the Castro Walgreens, looking for one that could print our photos so late at night — the night before we so urgently needed them for our Green Card interview.

Of course, we bickered. “Why is everything always left to the last minute?” “Why are we always so frantic whenever there is anything important to be done with a deadline?” “The wedding was just like this!” The accusations and questions flew. But they were half-hearted, not cruel. Each one punctured by nervous laughs. The situation was just too important to have a go at a proper fight.

But then, the Ukrainian asked, “What are we going to say?”

“What do you mean what are we going to say? We’ll just answer whatever they ask.” They being the INS/USCIS. Bureaucrats who had the power to make our lives miserable just because they could.

“But are you going to tell them about the time we fought about XYZ?”

“No, no, we’ll leave that out.”

“What about the fact that you sometimes fall asleep on the sofa.”

“But then I wake up later and come join you bed so it’s fine.”

“I don’t think you should mention the sofa.”

“But if they ask. What if they ask if we always sleep in the same bed? What am I going to say. What if they take us into separate rooms and ask us these questions? I can’t lie. I am a terrible liar.” I don’t have a moral issue with lying. Indeed, I have a certain respect for people who clam up and keep their truths to themselves. But, I can’t. I start to and then I twist my words so that I tell the truth even when I am lying. I’m a terrible liar.

“You would never survive in Kiev or Moscow. Everyone lies there. You have to in order to survive.” Ah yes, that Soviet mentality that didn’t just die with the collapse of the Soviet Union.

“I didn’t say I’m not naturally suspicious of people. I just assume everyone is lying to me if there is any doubt in the matter. Unfortunately, I just can’t lie back.”

While I couldn’t exactly say I had been looking forward to putting our personal lives on display for the INS, I hadn’t exactly been worried about it. But this conversation with the Ukrainian….this attempt to repackage our lives into some sort of perfect storybook tale free of blemishes and flaws made me ill to my stomach. If our stories differed at all, the INS would have no problem making our lives as difficult as possible in forcing us to prove we have a bona-fide marriage — to prove that the Ukrainian didn’t marry me for a green card. The validity of our relationship had been on trial since the day we got engaged — the U.S. Government would not be the first to ask, “How do you know the marriage is not for the Green Card”, my family and friends had asked that plenty of times. But only the U.S. government had to the power to say, “No. We don’t think your husband loves you. He needs to go back to Ukraine.”

It was with this foreboding mood, I took the DVD with the photos chronicling our lives and weddings into the Walgreens at Castro and 18th Street. I explained to the man behind the photo counter that I needed the photos printed quite urgently. “Would it be possible to get them tonight?” I asked, letting my desperation show in my voice.
“Oh, that’s no problem. I can have them for you in about an hour. How many are they?” he replied.
“200.”
His eyebrows raised. An urgent order on 200 photos in the middle of the night. Whatever could they be?
“My husband and I have our Green Card interview with the INS tomorrow. We need to show them we are truly married and in-love. These are the photos to do that.”
“My colleague here went through that,” the photo counter man responded.
“Oh really?” I acted enthused. I didn’t much care, but I figured the nicer I was to the photo counter man, the quicker he’d be about getting my photos printed.
“Yeah, he did. He married a woman who worked here as well. But the INS didn’t believe they were truly married. They thought my friend was gay since he lived here in the Castro. The INS even went over to their house to make sure that they were both living there. Made sure all his clothes were there and whatnot.”
The photo counter man had my attention now. Oh God, what if went through the same. I mentally envisioned our 3 closets. My wardrobe and assorted belongings took up over 2 of them. The Ukrainian, the ultimate minimalist, took up almost no room when he moved in. And our recent housecleaning effort led him to throw out any piece of paper or memento he had accumulated in the past year that he hadn’t deemed a true “need”. How would anyone be able to tell that we hadn’t just thrown his few clothes into a closet and a few books on a shelf and said he lived with me. His physical footprint on my life was small — marked more by the gifts he had given me than any sort of personal physical treadmarks on our joint belongings. But his emotional footprint was quite large.
“Oh wow, that must’ve been really tough.” I didn’t ask how the investigation turned out. I didn’t want to leave myself open for hearing bad news. “How long will it be before the photos are done printing?”
“An hour. Maybe a bit more.”
“Thanks.” I smiled, hurriedly. I wanted to be nice in order to get the photos. But the nausea in my stomach had grown more intense. I wanted nothing more than to get out of the Walgreens and breathe fresh air.

The Ukrainian was waiting for me outside with our 2 dogs. I told him how long it would be before the pictures would be ready.
“How many pictures did you give them to print?”
“200″
“You are crazy!! We are going to have the most pictures anyone has ever taken to the INS!”
“Better too many than not enough.” I was too risk-averse than to not have a picture for any moment in our life together that had to be proven as true.

…..

The Ukrainian waits at Samovars with the dogs for our wedding photos for INS to finish printing at the Castro Walgreens.

We decided to wait out the photoprocessing at the Samovar Tea Lounge at 18th and Sanchez. A bar would’ve been more appropriate, but we had the dogs with us. Although he’s usually a positive person, the Ukrainian was not feeling so happy. He made fun of the place for calling itself “Samovar” — a sort of Slavic or Central Asian tea kettle — but not having a samovar on the premises. I pointed out the Samovar on the counter by the cash register. But he had a point. It didn’t seem the water was boiled in a samovar. It was just a catchy name for advertising.

The tea lounge also had a Russian food plate, but the Ukrainian wasn’t interested. We shared a salmon caesar salad. My nerves from the upcoming interview had been upped by the Walgreens photo counter man. I couldn’t eat. I spent our wait chatting with the Ukrainian about mostly nothing and picking the salmon bits out of my share of the salad to give to the dogs. We kept looking at our watches. Is it time? Is it time, we wondered. Is it time for the photos? Is it time to get the government seal of approval for our marriage? Is it time to truly start planning for a baby? Is it time to plan for our trip back to Kiev for our Russian Orthodox wedding? Is it time to get on with our lives. Is it time to stop waiting. Is it time?

The conversation turned to our planned Orthodox wedding in Kiev. How many people could we expect to come? How much would it cost? How would we budget for it? What happens if I get pregnant first? Would I really want to endure such a long journey and unknown culture while with child. We could only decide that if I become pregnant soon, then we would postpone the wedding to 2010 and have a baptism and wedding the same week. But if I don’t become pregnant soon, the baby itself will have to wait.

Waiting. That is all I feel like we do sometimes. We wait for the Ukrainian to graduate. We wait for the Green Card. We wait for him to get another raise. We wait to save money. Wait and wait and wait. Tomorrow, it seemed — we hoped — tomorrow could be the end to one of our waits.

Our wait for the photos came to the end. We paid our bill, leaving the money outdoors on the table, hoping no one would take it before the waitress found it. But I suspected she was waiting for us to leave. She must’ve been watching us. So I didn’t truly worry. The Ukrainian did, but I reassured him that no one who waits tables is so naive to leave their tables unwatched. We walked back to the Walgreens at 18th and Castro. I picked up the photos and purchased a small, cheap album that looked sort of wedding-ish. The photo counter man looked a bit at my photos before handing them to me: “The INS will believe you. This is a beautiful wedding.”
“I hope so,” I replied, tired. It was too late now to gather anymore evidence of our love. What we had is what we had.
And so the Ukrainian and I returned home with the dogs to sleep. And to wait. And to hope that maybe the beginning of the end of our waiting had begun.

Green Card Update #2

Tomorrow is our green card interview. We have spent the past several evenings rushing around trying to make sure all our paperwork is in order. We sent in a 4-inch thick packet of paperwork with our application in May, but we want to bring duplicates in case the INS (USCIS) lost anything. Additionally, I have legally changed my name as well as my employer — so we have new documents to bring that prove:
1) Our marriage is “real”. We love each other (hence the proof that I have changed my name — though not all women marrying foreigners do this).
2) I can financially support him. Not necessary in that the Ukrainian can support himself. However, if anything should happen, I need to prove I can support him as I am legally financially responsible for him for the next 10 years if the greencard is approved.
3) We have co-mingled our assets, bank accounts, health insurance, etc. Usually, the INS likes to see a joint mortgage or lease. But, we don’t have a proper lease on our apartment (we are tenants of one of San Francisco’s famous privately-owned month-to-month rent-controlled ancient Victorian flats). As such, we have gone above and beyond the requirements of showing merged assets to prove we have a ‘true marriage’.

Later today, I need to go down to Walgreens to print photos from our family wedding, honeymoon, engagement party, trip to Iowa and any other significant event that has happened since May that shows we married for love.

Tomorrow, as I mentioned, is the appointment. Even though the USCIS office is only 1 block from my work office, I have scheduled the entire day off. I do not want to risk anything that might put me in a bad mood and cause me to show up for our interview surly. Best to be relaxed and happy. Oddly, we are not allowed to carry cellphones or anything of the like into the interview. Even turned off. They *must* be left at home. Or, for those who have forgotten, you can leave them at the bodega across the street for a small charge.

Wish us luck!!

Russian men bring you flowers

From 2005 – 2006, I lived in the Netherlands and had a fairly serious Dutch boyfriend. One night, in February 2006 just before Valentine’s Day, my boss invited me and my boyfriend over for a weeknight dinner, prepared by his lovely wife girlfriend-of-18-years. Midway through the meal, the conversation migrated from American vs. Dutch traditions of Valentine’s Day presents to American vs. Dutch traditions of romantic presents for your beloved in general. I made the observation that Dutch men do not seem to bother with flowers and jewelry for their wives and girlfriends.

“That is true,” said the boss’s wife. “If you want flowers, you have to buy your own.”

“That’s boring,” I replied. “Where’s the charm?! The chivalry?! The romance?!”

“Dutch men are just never going to give you romance, ” the wife girlfriend declared. “In 18 years that we have been together, I have never once received flowers or jewelry from him.” These final few words were delivered with a very pointed look at my boss.

“I gave you flowers once,” my then-boyfriend interjected, looking smug, as if he had won some sort of Dutch-I’m-so-chivalrous contest.

“Yeah, once. For Christmas. That’s it, so it doesn’t really count,” I replied. He wasn’t going to get off so easily for being lazy in the romance department.

“Hei, ja! I gave you earrings once! Those red ones!” my boss exclaimed in victory, looking at his wife girlfriend as he leaned back in his chair with his hands behind his head, smug as well. He could be redeemed!!

“Earrings? Earrings?” the wife turned my boss.  “No, those were red pimples for my ears! Tiny red pimples! They were the most divorce-worthy present you could give me!”

Not being able to bear a lifetime without flowers, chivalry and romance, I left the Dutchman a mere 7 weeks later (ok, maybe there were a few other reasons too — but they would’ve been more bearable with a little romance to take the edge off). Barely a year passed before I met the Ukrainian. A man with exquisite taste in jewelry, and a regular deliverer of flowers to our kitchen table. He always does it at a moment when I’m not looking, so that even though the flowers are a regular appearance, they are always a surprising appearance, thus keeping the romance alive!

Last Saturday, after the exquisitely painful experience at the vet where we agonized over just how many unnecessary tests and procedures could we deprive our dogs of, we went to Trader Joe’s on 9th and Bryant. We did our shopping, came to the checkout line, and suddenly I remember that I had forgotten to buy the dogs their weekly treats of SoftAndChewyPeanutButterYumYumTreatsForDogs. I stepped just 7 feet away from the cart, turned around, and studied the shelves until I found the box I was looking for. I turned back around, spied out cart, and saw the gorgeous pink flowers filling the cart’s child seat.

It was romance-at-the-grocery-store. Proof that being good towards your wife can be the smallest gesture of love in the most mundane moment. No special occasion needed.