Wine corks, weddings and power tools (or how I wooed my wife)

I invited Gina over for dinner for our second date. It was the day after our first, and I was trying to impress her. She knocked on the door carrying a bottle of white wine, and after I gave her the tour of the house I went to open it. I am not much of a wine drinker or wine opener. But for the sake of romance, I tried.

I had a perfectly nice cork remover. Too bad I’d never used it. By the time the wine was open and dinner was served, I had worked up quite a sweat. We’re talking one of those temperature-rising, forehead tributaries kinds of sweats, which did not bode well with my intentions to be Mr. Suave for Gina.

So I dried off, served the chicken marsala, and tried to regain my cool. But as we ate, I had to constantly excuse myself to blot my forehead. Gina pretended not to notice as I turned my back to her, clutched a piece of paper towel and swiped at the latest stream. This went on for half the meal. I’m sure it was quite attractive.

But considering Gina stayed until 3:00 in the morning, I must not have been too repulsive. Now the issue racing through my mind was how to make my move. Gina accelerated my time line when she looked at the VCR and realizing what time it was, literally sprang to her feet. You’d have thought that her car was becoming a pumpkin, she was in such a hurry to leave.

I walked Gina to her car while my brain screamed “kiss her, you fool!” But still reeling from her sudden departure, I moved in for a hug. I waved as she disappeared around the corner and told myself, “you blew it.”

The next day, once I got some sleep, I shifted into damage control. At the time Gina was working in a different branch of the same company, so I sent the wine cork through dispatch with a note in an envelope. “Here’s a memento from our date. Can we have dinner soon?”

Gina thought this was funny and came over later that week. She didn’t bring any wine this time, or ever again for that matter. She must have preferred me fresh for our dates instead of in need of a shower.

Fast forward to our wedding week. Gina came over in the middle of the week to help make wedding favors, and we realized it was going to be a lot more work than we thought. We both were getting punchy and a little cranky as the hours passed by, and around 3:00 am, Gina’s witching hour, she asked if I had a drill.

“What do you need a drill for?” I said. And no, I did not assume violence.

“It’s a secret,” Gina said.

I fetched the drill from the garage and Gina holed up in the spare room. I tried not to fret that my bride-to-be was drilling at 3:00 in the morning, especially since she’s a little clumsy. But she emerged unscathed.

“How’d it go?” I asked.

She returned the drill. I was equally relieved and intrigued.

We exchanged gifts the night of our wedding, and it was then I saw what the drilling was for. Gina had kept the cork and mounted it inside a shadow box, along with a beautiful poem she wrote entitled The Wedding Drink.

I’m not going to share the poem with you. That’s between Gina and me. But I can say that it’s cherished, and true. And how much I love my wife.

Happy Anniversary, Gina.

You keep getting better with time.