His Eyes

One of the things I remember most about the early days of my marriage to Andrew was how he would look at me with his intensely blue eyes, wide, serious.  Like he was memorizing me, and wanted to get it right.  There are more permanent crinkles around the corners of those eyes now, and his eyebrows get so bushy sometimes I have to trim them or he ends up looking like Lloyd Briges in Airplane!.  The photo is us, about five years ago, New Year's eve, and his eyes are the violet-y color of a man who has had a lot to drink.  ;)

I've seen those eyes pensive and scanning the wreckage of The USS Arizona in Hawaii, squinting in the almost too bright to stand sunlight of Alaska near the glacier.  I've seen them smiling at me as we kissed under that kissing bridge in Paris.  When we were having the kiddos and I was wide-open cesearean while he looked on, I could tell he was sort of woozy because his eyes were waaaay bluer than normal in his pale, about-to-pass out face. 

His eyes have always been a barometer to the things he doesn't say.

When we met, and he was a student aviator in Pensacola, he wore the ugly wire-rimmed aviator glasses he wears now.  I liked him because he was a little nerdy and didn't care about those uncool glasses, glasses they used to call "Birth control" glasses.  Weirdly enough, his and my eye prescription are almost exactly the same, and in the last few years, his eyes have not tolerated contacts, so I've mostly seen those ugly glasses.  He hasn't been vain enough to care to buy more stylish ones and I haven't really minded but...

However.  This week (tomorrow) we are going to Texas, where he will get LASIK to fix those pretty blue eyes so that he will see as well as I do now. (He has to have it done by a military doctor or lose his flight status). It will be a long week, and I worry way more about him getting the procedure than I worried about myself. 

But it will be nice to see those deeply blue eyes without anything in the way again.  Waking up in the morning, crinkles at the edges, eyes that speak to me of memory today and tomorrow and today again.