It’s no secret that I am not one who believes in the whole fairy tale version of love and romance.

It’s great in a novel – heck, I was even a guest author in a romance collection recently.

But in real life, it just never happens the way we expect it to.

Maybe, just maybe it is because my husband is not romantic at all.

His idea of a birthday gift once was “not riding his bike” so he could spend the day with me.

I rolled my eyes so hard I am surprised they aren’t still in the back of my head.

He has always struggled with getting cards that were meaningful until our child was able to read. Cole has been picking out cards for years now.

Someone complimented me on my anniversary gift – a necklace -- recently and I told them it was a vast improvement over the years.

“He has bought me some really bad jewelry in the past,” I said.

“Is there such a thing?” the lady asked half-joking.

“Oh, trust me. There is.”

In addition to not being one of those puffy heart romantic girls, I am also not one who is enamored with diamonds or expensive jewels.
Nope. Give me silver and turquoise or costume jewelry any day over diamond. Or some rocks that were just mined out of a bucket – even better.

And definitely not any pawn shop jewelry, like Lamar tried when he was looking for my engagement ring.

“I can get you more diamond for less money in here,” he said as he was leading me in the store.

 “You think you are going to get me some used borrowed love? Seriously?”

I didn’t care about his logic. He tried to justify he could get me a bigger ring at a pawn store. I argued I did not care about carats or clarity; I would rather have something I could use than a piece of jewelry. But he thought he needed to get me a “big hunk of diamond,” as he called it.
“Oh, that’s so sweet,” the lady said. “You must have known he was the one when he said that!”

Not exactly.

“No, I tried to break up with him not long after that,” I said.

“What? Why?”
Well, remember the whole “I didn’t go bike riding” gift he gave me? That was after we were married.

When we were dating, he spent one whole Sunday riding his bike.

And it was a rare Sunday I had off.

I usually worked every Sunday and had looked forward to a day when we both were off and could spend time together.

After I had dressed for the day, I had called him and got his voice mail.
“Hey…just giving you a call. Wanted to see what you wanted to do today. Didn’t know if you wanted me to cook or if you wanted to go out to eat. Call me when you get this.”

I left that at around 10 a.m.

A few hours went by. He had not called. Maybe he was taking care of the dogs.

I left another message around 2:30.
“Just wanted to check in and see what we were going to do today. Call me.”

I had food thawing I could cook but hadn’t eaten all day because I wasn’t sure what he wanted to do.

A few more hours passed with no call.
“I am worried about you…please call me.”

This is why I come across as someone who doesn’t care; my anxiety and worry can make me look like I need a Lifetime movie based on my actions.  I immediately thought the worst-case scenario and started panicking.

Then, I realized, he was probably riding his bike.

His bike. On the rare day we both had a day off.

My last message was, “Hey. I don’t think this going to work. At all. So don’t worry about calling me back. In fact, just delete my number out of your phone. I don’t want to hear from you ever again.”

An hour later, he called. “What?”

“I have nothing to say!” I said and hung up the phone.
I’m telling y’all; the drama was so thick, I needed my own Lifetime movie.

Fifteen minutes later, he showed up at my apartment.

“Why are you here?” I asked.

“We’re going to talk this out. I don’t want us to break up so we are going to work through this.”
This is probably the most this man has ever said in one-time frame in 14 years.

“There’s nothing to talk about.”

He walked in my office and sat down on the couch. To make it even worse, Pepper, my evil beagle, hopped up beside him as if taking sides. Little traitor.

“I just don’t think this is going to work out. I think we want different things in life; we have different goals, we don’t see things the same way…” I rattled off a lengthy list of proof as to why we needed to go ahead and pull the relationship plug.

He looked at me for a second before asking, “Are you hungry?”

“What?”

“Are you hungry? What have you eaten today?”

I frowned. “I had coffee this morning but didn’t eat because I was waiting on you.”
“So all you have had is coffee?”

I nodded.

“How about we go get some food and then you can break up with me.”
“What kind of food….”

“You want Pizza Hut? They have that cheese stuffed crust now. I will even take you to Dairy Queen for dessert.”
Over Blizzards sitting on the tailgate of his truck, he asked me if I was still going to break up with him.

I told him I had tabled the idea for the time being.

I mean, it was Pizza Hut and Dairy Queen. How could anyone turn that down?
More importantly, how was I skinny back then if that is what I ate?

Jewelry and diamonds do not win me over. Apparently, the best way to my heart is to feed me.