You CAN teach an old dog new tricks.

My husband is awesome and amazing.  I remember when I knew I was going to marry him.  It scared me to death because I was 18.  I was leaving for a mission trip with church but had gone to his church that morning.  Before I left he gave me a CD he'd made with two songs on it.

One song was "When You Say Nothing at All" by Allison Krauss.  It was sung at my brother's wedding and has always been beautiful to me.

Then it faded into... another song.  He might kill me for telling you this.  It was the cuppycake song.

I laughed.  Then I teared up.  Then I knew I would marry him.  Not sure what it was about the cuppycake song, but it got to me.

That was July and our first fight argument didn't come until later.  December 31st to be exact.  We were on our way to a New Year's Eve party with his church.

sidenote: I still keep up with all these people.  And none of us have aged.

But before that picture was taken, while we were still driving to the house...

Dun dun dun.

By this time we had discussed marriage.  He'd taken me out on a romantic paddle boat ride to tell me when he was thinking about marriage.  I like paddle boats because it reminded me of Santa's Land, but he later confessed that he was scared I'd run when he said the word marriage.

Me?  Run?  Where would I run to?  We were driving his truck!  And hello, I was an 18 year old girl... very few wouldn't want to hear those words.

Although we both I had a good laugh because the "lake" that we'd rented a paddle boat on was very warm and there was always steam rising off of it.  And well, Josh is really hot natured. He was literally dripping in sweat by the end of it.  That and he was still nervous that I'd jump in and swim away after hearing the word 'marriage.'

Where was I?  Oh yes, our first fight argument.  We were driving towards the party and I had no idea where we were and didn't like being in unfamiliar places in the dark so I might have been a teensy bit on edge anyway.

We got on the topic of how life would have to change when we got married.

"Jigsaw will definitely be kennel trained first thing."

"Excuse me?"

"Yeah... he's going to have to be kennel trained.  That dog is spoiled and needs a little discipline in his life."

"You're not sticking my dog in a box and leaving him there all day.  No."

"Susan, this isn't even a discussion.  He has to be kennel trained.  I'm not going to have him messing up the house while we're gone."

Okay, so that may not be exactly what was said.  But it's pretty close.  And if you've read my "Cast of Characters" page, then you know not to say anything about my precious Jigsaw.

As a foreshadowing of what our marriage would be like, Josh eventually had to pull off the side of the road so we could talk about it before we went to the party.

That was December 31st, 2004.  August of 2008, Jigsaw learned what a kennel was.  And today?  Today the dog lays in there for fun.  He loves that stupid thing.  I'm not sure why, but it sure does make my life a lot easier.

PS:  We don't put both of them in the kennel at the same time... they willfully did this themselves, so I shut the door and took a picture!

The end.