30DSC: A Song That Reminds You of a Certain Event

30-Day Song Challenge Day 5: A Song That Reminds You of a Certain Event

I'm taking some liberties with this one and switching Day 5 with Day 7.  I'd like to talk about an event that happened ten years ago today.

On October 6, 2001, I married the love of my life.

Ours was a fall-themed wedding with a 1940s/1950s-crooner vibe.  We drove away from the church in a maroon 1947 Packard limousine.  The flowers and the decor were rich, autumnal colors.  We hand-picked all the music: Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin, Bobby Darin, Bing Crosby, Ella Fitzgerald.  Big band, swing, pop standards.



When it came time to decide on the song for our first dance, there was no question what it would be.

Nat King Cole's "The Very Thought of You."

Our first date was a work get-together that ended up being just the two of us for a couple of hours before anyone else showed up.  We'd been co-workers for a few months (I was the HR manager and he was an install tech), and that night I confirmed my suspicions: Troy was the one.  As we talked, we learned we had a lot in common, including our love for the movie Home for the Holidays.

Here's my journal entry from the night I saw Home for the Holidays with my roommate Jana and my friend Erin at the dollar theater in Minnetonka:

2/9/1996
Tonight I saw the most amazing movie.  I think it came out around Thanksgiving, that's when it took place, and it was billed as a movie about family and coming home.  And it was, in a way, but it was so much more than that.  It was about moments.  It was about the times in your life that you can't capture, that just happen without warning, and they fill you with joy or anger or complete and unending love, whatever the emotion, but the point is, they happen and then they are gone.  And you can't get them back.  How many times have I written about this, about moments I would give anything to have back?

At the end, when they were showing some of those moments for all the characters, I started to cry when crazy Aunt Glady kisses Henry in his sharp blue uniform one Christmas Eve and I just sat there for such a long time, long after the credits had ended.


Almost three years to the day, I went out for drinks with a co-worker and it changed my life.  No one was there to capture it on film.  We didn't even film our wedding, our first dance to this lovely song. 

The very thought of you and I forget to do
The little ordinary things that everyone ought to do
I'm living in a kind of daydream
I'm happy as a king
And foolish though it may seem
To me that's everything

The mere idea of you, the longing here for you
You'll never know how slow the moments go till I'm near to you
I see your face in every flower
Your eyes in stars above
It's just the thought of you
The very thought of you, my love

The mere idea of you, the longing here for you
You'll never know how slow the moments go till I'm near to you
I see your face in every flower
Your eyes in stars above
It's just the thought of you
The very thought of you, my love



Home for the Holidays is still an important film for us.  We watch it every Thanksgiving and we quote it year-round.  And it still brings me to tears.  Ten years after our first dance as a married couple, Troy and I continue to have moments of pure joy and love and they just happen and live within us in our memories.

The Point:

 The Very Thought of You:
 

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