Still, I love horse races (Gold Cup and Foxfields being my most frequent horse races) and the fact that we live so close to Belmont, called me to the Belmont Stakes every year. Plus, it's a really big deal in our town. They have a town celebration in honor of it the day after every year. One main problem with going has been that it's always on the same weekend which is also our anniversary, my mother's birthday, and Great-Grandma Ruth's birthday so we never have a lot of motivation or a readily available babysitter.
A few things happened this year to motivate me. One is that the race fell exactly on our anniversary and we weren't sure what to do for anniversary anyway. We just went to a fancy night our for our 5th anniversary (6 months late) and a big trip isn't in our budget or time allowance right now. The second thing that happened was that American Pharoah won the first two races. It was at least theoretically possible that we could have a Triple Crown win on our anniversary. The third thing was that our kids had gotten used to a hired babysitter over the last 8 months. So we knew who to call so we could go to Belmont for a little while.
But Kevin was concerned. While we had a really good time in 2011, Kevin was less than impressed with the actual horse track facilities. He was worried that our anniversary wouldn't "be nice enough." I thought this was a little strange considering he loves dive bars. My counter-point: what if it's the Triple Crown? So off to the races we went.
In front of the ivy-covered windows of Belmont Park
While we were emotionally betting on American Pharoah to win, we did not actually bet on American Pharaoh to win because the payout would be pretty low. We'd have to bet a lot to gain anything if he won, and that would mean we'd lose a lot if he lost. So we bet on some less likely horses #6 (my pick because 6th anniversary yo!) and #8 (Kevin's pick). Then we did a trifecta bet that American pharoah would win, #6 would be second (my choice again), and #8 would be third. The trifecta bet had a least a chance of having a nice payout for our very little $10 bet.
In line to place our trifecta bet!
YAY!! TRIPLE CROWN!!
American Pharoah became the first triple crown winner in 37 years! Oh but the horses came in 5, 6, 7. Oh well. Still totally worth it. I will post a video of everyone running out of the stands cheering as soon as I get caught up on videos.
Also, I often post something about our actual marriage in my anniversary posts. This is my thought this year. Each spouse has the responsibility of being the best spouse they can be- not as the temptation drives many- to make the other person be the best spouse they can be. In other words, as a wife, my job is to be the best wife I can be, not to make Kevin be a better husband. He's a great husband any way, and yes, I can talk to him about whatever problem I have, but my main focus is to be more loving to him in the way that he would most appreciate me showing him love. For me, love is very "showy": words, kisses, hugs. For him, love is very action-based. I can love him best when I do things to support him at home, in his career, his mental state, etc. He is awesome at doing these things for me probably in part because he feels they're so important for him. So that's what I'm working on. I hope that my effort is itself a show of love on my way to actually achieving what he wants.
