being joelikki

i'm a sprawler. every morning, joel wakes up and gets out of bed before i do,

and every morning, once he's gone, i somehow end up sprawled across our entire bed.

every. morning. it's kind of my favorite.

yesterday morning was no different. i woke up in the middle of the bed, by myself, sprawled out like usual. i took my time crawling out from my sweet spot and eventually went into the living room to see what joel was up to. he was studying and eating cereal. he gave me a kiss and said good morning.

he seemed dandy, at first.

then, a little while later, he suddenly seemed a little less dandy.

and a little while after that, he was really anything but dandy...

...one long car ride, three hours in the ER, and a CT scan later, we found ourselves listening to a perfectly friendly doctor tell us how joel's appendix had decided it was kind of over being joel's appendix, and that they needed to take him in for surgery.

he really knows how to keep things exciting around here.

we were both fairly relieved to at least know why he had been in so much pain, but not particularly looking forward to everything that was to follow...especially joel...poor guy has finals in three days. (fun, right?)

the rest of the day was kind of a blur, filled with nurses and doctors and phone calls, and more nurses and more doctors and more phone calls. everything went really well, and to be honest, never at any point during the day was i really worried that it wouldn't. but it was a long day, and by the time everyone left (his sisters and some friends were at the hospital with us for a good part of the evening, which was so nice), i was tired, and just so glad that he was okay and back to being his happy, although slightly sore and drugged, self.

joel spent the night at the hospital. after he got settled, i drove home and climbed into bed by myself.
as i laid there, all i could think about was how much i wished the other side of it weren't empty. i was so tired. it was late. i had the whooole bed to myself. i could spread and sprawl and lay about any way i wanted...

normally, having our bed to myself for a night would have sounded so comfy (sorry husband), and yet the only thing that felt comfortable right then was curling up on my side of the bed so i could pretend that my sweet, appendix-less husband was right there next to me, "hogging" the bed like he always does.

...

last night was one of those little moments that happen every so often, when i realize, and i mean really realize, just how lucky i am to have such an amazing person in my life.
even if it means having to share the bed.
even if it means pretending to be an adult (ha) and spending all day in the hospital talking about insurance and signing consent forms.
even if it means rushing out the door without having a chance to put in my contacts or brush my teeth (tmi?) and parading around the post-op floor in a format t-shirt, listening (alll dayyy longg) to nurses saying things like, "wow, he really robbed the cradle, didn't he?"

i blame it on the glasses and ponytail.