October is here, and I am happy.

I’ll be happier when I get a new camera to document the earliest autumn in recent memory though. But today, it’s raining, possibly storming later. My knee’s been bothering me, and I enjoy the bus. So I rode in that noisy beast’s belly today. Grabbed a coffee at work just now, crossing the street on cold sandaled feet and under the cheap black umbrella I bought at South Station in Boston eight weeks ago today. It reminds me of fall 2002, when I lived in Boston and when we had a spectacular fall. We went to Salem and celebrated Halloween like never before. Walden Pond on what might be the most beautiful fall day I have ever lived through.

It also reminds me that, this time five years ago, I was speeding (literally, doing like 90 mph because I was an idiot) toward Baltimore to get married. Regardless of how the wedding actually went (what, with certain family members who — admittedly — tried to ruin it because they didn’t like our style and our refusals of their suggestions), October 4th is my favorite day. And regardless of the stressful, infuriating, quick event our wedding was, October 4th was also the day that we got together, back in 1997.

So while people keep asking me how many years October 4th makes, I qualify my answer that it’s eleven for me. My wedding was not when I was committed. It was not even when I was publicly committed. It didn’t change how I feel about my wife at all. Nothing can.