The evening sky

Monday night I drove out to a gravel road with my husband and sat on the hood of our car and watched the stars. We could see the Milky Way and the Big Dipper and Orion's belt. We faintly saw the Northern Lights which were the whole reason we were going out there-- but instead, we saw so much more.

We saw our past: laying on the trampoline in Brent's backyard talking about our future and the fear of leaving for college and leaving each other. We saw us on another gravel road, with the same name as the one we now share. He had just asked me to share it with him forever, and then played songs on the car's stereo and we danced in the moonlight to "You Had Me From Hello" and "With You." He held me and those future fears were answered.

As we sat on the hood of that car Monday night we also remembered moments from our individual pasts: taking my aging, nearly blind grandma to that same gravel road so many years before and seeing the joy in her face over actually being able to see the stars, which were so bright for her that evening. We didn't know this would be her last time to see those twinkling lights above before her vision was completely taken from her. Brent recalled winning a Courtwarming basketball game in a packed gym with fans going crazy. He drove to an empty gravel road, parked his old Toyota, and lay on the hood, soaking up the crystal clear night, not wanting the feeling of that moment , that victory, those cheers, to pass him by.

**
Goosebumps creep up my legs, I feel our baby kick inside me, and we decide it's time to go. Brent piles back in the car and toots the horn while I'm still sitting on the hood. I jump in the air before climbing in the passenger's seat and playfully punching him in the arm.

We drive the mile back into town holding hands, our past, our future, and those stars.