As tempting as it is I won’t be self indulgent and repeat the story I told last year in my blog entry titled The Life Changing Day. Suffice to say that on November 15th 1991 I kissed Prajna for the first time and my life was never the same after that. That was 20 years ago. So this week we celebrate our 20th anniversary. And hurray that the earth has gone around the sun for a number of times divisible by the fingers on two hands. It’s sometimes funny to think that the 23rd might not be as special. Even though it’s more than 20, it’s prime.
I do think that 20 years is something special. Prajna and I started out as a sweet, happy couple. I worked nights at KNUI radio. Prajna listened to the station for most of the day while I was sleeping. One day she called KNUI and requested a song for me. I slept through it but she told me that Billy Joel’s Just the way you Are played for me. I was touched and flattered. I couldn’t remember anyone ever asking a song on the radio for me. And this song meant a lot to me.
I said I love you, and that’s forever
And this I promice from the heart
I could not love you any better
I love you just the way you are
I realized I needed to reciprocate. That night at work I brooded over what song to play for her. I liked The Joker by Steve Miller. Referring to myself as a space cowboy and saying I was a smoker made sense. But he said the word love or lovie-dovie too much. And I didn’t want to use the word love. Billy Joel wasn’t afraid to mention that word. But I was. I didn’t feel I wanted to say that word yet. Not until I was more than positive that I meant it. So I finally settled on a song. It painted a picture of a carefree soul and didn’t talk about love. I left a note to the afternoon DJ requesting The Allman Brothers Band’s Ramblin’ Man.
Sometimes I hear that song on the radio today and marvel that we ever got together. But of course another thing happens when it comes on nowadays. Prajna and I smile together. Because we did get off to a bit of a rocky start. Like two young people learning a new dance together, we stepped on each other’s feet once in a while and took bad steps that led us away from each other. But the important thing is that the music kept playing and we kept at it. We learned the steps as we went and became better.
On Thanksgiving of that same year I finally told Prajna that I loved her. Not long after when I knew she was listening on my shift I pulled Three Dog Night’s Old Fashioned Love Song. I think that it made up for the ambiguous lyrics before.
I don’t work for a radio station now and I’m no longer on a first name basis with any air personalities. But I never call up radio stations anymore anyway. Nowadays whenever a song comes on and the spirit moves one of us we will turn to the other and say “I called them up and asked them to play this for you.” It’s just another step in the dance we’ve been doing for two decades now. It’s warm and familiar. Just like it ought to be.
Prajna, I love you just the way you are.
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