Flashback Friday...The Black Pearl

Hawaiian Honeymoon, 1991

Get a load of those BABIES! Oh my goodness, do we look like we're going to prom (if even that) or what?

That was 19 years ago. Nineteen. It's hard to believe we've been doing this for 19 years. I still feel like the luckiest girl on the planet. As much as I loved him then, I can honestly say I love him a million times more now.

We have some good friends in Carlsbad, CA. He's our dentist actually...but first he was our Bishop at church.

(Trivia: For those of you who don't know how a Bishop could be a dentist or vice versa...that's because we don't have professional/paid clergy in our church...everyone does their part to make the Church run...and everyone also has a day job. For those of you who read "he was our Bishop and now he's our dentist" and think "DUH! Aren't all Bishops dentists?"...you must be Mormon, too!)

Anyhoo, I remember having a conversation one night with this friend and she was recounting how her student-husband (then boyfriend) worked at a carwash and had to borrow the money from his parents for her engagement ring when he wanted to ask her to marry him. Her parents were none too thrilled with this prospect. She was reflecting back that no wonder they were devastated, no wonder they had their doubts...he worked at a carwash, for crying out loud! But he was finishing up college and applying for dental school. She was almost done with nursing school. They had their future mapped out...but to the outside world, it seemed like a huge gamble. I only had the benefit of meeting them more than a dozen years and four kids later...with lots of years of successful business and Church service behind them. I could look back and say, "Well, duh! Everyone should have been able to see their bright future!"

But so it was with Cliff and I. He was just finishing college...I was just starting. I had two years of military service, he was only in the reserves while attending college. Each of us had roommates to make ends meet. Cliff sold guns and fishing poles when he wasn't on campus. I was an E-4 in the Navy. I had just come back to the Church, Cliff didn't have any church affiliation. He was so skinny, a weight loss from illness was liable to put him in the hospital. I was...well...MUCH skinnier, anyway. What the heck did we know about life?

I'll tell you what I knew. I knew he was unlike any other man I had ever dated. Ever. I dated a LOT...both members of my Church and not. Military and civilian. I knew I did not want to marry the Mormon "resume." I had seen enough of that in my life to know it wasn't a guarantee of anything. I knew that if I got married, it would be to someone good and genuine, inside and out. How would I know what that looked like? Easy. I knew what it didn't look like.

I'm just being flippant, actually...I didn't know what that would look like. But I knew enough that when I dated yet another superficial, self-centered guy I met at a Southern California "singles" Church activity, I could cross him off the list. Or when I met yet another Marine whose idea of the perfect day was four hours at the gym followed by a night of drinking with the guys...he didn't get another look.

(Trivia: While this was happening...Cliff was contemplating moving to Texas to find a wife. Yes, Texas. I've never been to Texas before, but he had this theory that all the women in So Cal were too shallow and self absorbed to make a good companion...but that Texas seemed like it would have more down-to-earth women. I am just grateful he went with plan "B"...which was to date as many women as possible in his own area...which is how he came to ask me out. And yes, we are both from Southern California, and I realize I'm stereotyping...but stereotypes become that way for a reason. Just sayin'.)

Maybe I'll share the full story for our 20th...but for now, this is already getting too long. I'll just sum it up by saying, the first date we went on, I was absolutely spell-bound. It was the best (and cheapest) date I had ever been on...and I knew that he was something special. Because of the car he drove or the wads of cash he was pulling in? Because of his advanced degrees or his family connections? Because of his smokin' hot, "pumped up" body? (Did I mention how skinny he was?) None of that.

It was because Clifford Stuart is THE MOST GOOD man I have ever met. The GOODest. The most selfless, genuine, overcomer-of-adversity I have ever known. It still blows my mind to see him in action every day as a father, a husband, a friend, or a chaplain. I don't know what I ever did to deserve to be his wife, but I am just grateful. Is he perfect? No. He struggles with patience and balancing priorities (just like me). But he constantly re-evaluates and continually tries harder to do better for his family...and is such an example to me to keep trying.

This was not the direction I intended to go with this post, but it just sort of developed (as did the tears streaming down my face as I type this). The story I was going to tell was about our honeymoon. We were nearly broke after paying for our wedding. We weren't even going to have a honeymoon. But Cliff's best friend's parents (Hi Bob and Gretchen...we love you!) decided we HAD to have a honeymoon. They bought us plane tickets to Hawaii, and we made hotel reservations at the Hale Koa (the military resort, which shares a beach with the Hilton Hawaiian Village) at a rate of $54 a night (based on my E-4 rank) for a week of pure bliss. We arrived with our mismatched luggage and no itinerary, except to sleep in every morning as late as possible. This we did, just ducking into the cafe in time for a macadamia nut waffle before they stopped serving breakfast.

I don't remember much of what we did and saw, but I know we did go shopping at the International Market Place. We stopped at one of those stands where you can buy an oyster to open (which has a pearl inside, you just don't know what kind). Ours contained a lovely, rare black pearl. While we considered our good fortune, we didn't bother to think about "the catch". They get you, by counting on the fact that you will pay for the setting. And pay, we did. Did we buy just a pendant? No. They made sure to show the honeymoooners the gold ring with maile leaves (leaves made into leis for the traditional royal Hawaiian wedding ceremony) with small diamonds which would perfectly caress our black pearl. Hook. Line. And sinker.

As we got back to our normal lives with the rest of the working people, I still had my ring as a daily reminder of the amazing, care-free week we had together. As we added four babies to the mix, on particularly rough days...when we'd have a moment to connect in all the chaos, Cliff would often say, "Remember the macadamia nut waffles?" And that was all it took to bring me back to the days.

Well, I had no idea how to care for pearls properly. Actually, I probably heard they were delicate and needed to be treated accordingly, but I would be darned if I wasn't going to bring my little piece of honeymoon everywhere I went. Always. About ten years ago, that caught up with me. The pearl's sheen started to disintegrate...probably from contact with vinegar. Or cleaning products. This is what happens where honeymoon meets real life. I was so remorseful. I put it away, hoping it could be fixed somehow...and forgot about it.

Until we got to Okinawa, that is. I suggested that we might replace the pearl while we are here, and handed the ring over to Cliff. Yesterday, while on our anniversary lunch date (over Hawaiian food, no less) Cliff gave me back my new and improved honeymoon ring, accompanied by a very sweet speech that I will not share here, but hold close to my heart. (I barely squeezed it onto my finger, and it may not come off again.)



The hands aren't nearly as youthful, but oh, they could tell you some stories! Were we crazy to think we could pull this off? Looking around at the odds, probably. We didn't have two nickles to rub together...and on the way home from that honeymoon, we literally spent our last $40 on the shuttle ride home from the airport. But what we lacked in material security...we have since made up for in a wealth of shared adversity, experience and small victories...which have become the mortar to the bricks of our relationship.

And for our twentieth? Cliff also surprised me with reservations for the Hale Koa next year. The price has more than quadrupled in twenty years (having something to do with the O-4 vs. E-4 rate, too, I'm sure) but I think after twenty years, it will be worth every penny. Bring on the macadamia nut waffles!