Dear Arlandria,
Your Mom and I have been together for two and a half years today. Let me tell you a bit about the day.
Your Mom came down to Tulsa from OKC to hang out with me and Grandpa D. We were going to a Wes Anderson film festival. Your Mom had never seen a Wes Anderson film before.
Backstory, Dad loves Moonrise Kingdom. It's his favorite Wes Anderson film, (even though Grand Budapest is probably better) because it is the film that best captures what Dad thinks the spirit of love is.
In Moonrise Kingdom two kids run away from their lives to be together, alone, on a little inlet. It's a dumb move. They're so sure about how correct it is though, and honestly, when they set out on the journey, they don't know that much about each other. Quickly they begin bumping into each other's personalities, they learn about each other. They are dedicated to the love, but she's made him into magic because he's an orphan - like the characters in the books she reads - and he's prickly because his background has given him some practical skills but not necessarily emotional ones. They are awkward, they are cute, they have a long journey ahead of them, and they go to the only place they think they can get away from everything.
When they get there they solidify. They become the couple we know they're going to be. Simple, easy, children. They share their first kiss together, just as awkward as every other moment together. Then when they wake up its all threatened.
Because everyone around them thinks its wrong. It's just wrong, they're being stupid, they're being dangerous, they're being young and in love and that's just not the way the world works, can't you see that you stupid dumb kids?
But none of these adults have it together either. Her Mom is cheating and his Foster parents simply "can't accept him back in their home." Her parents don't know her at all, and the world has nothing to do with him besides force him away from where he wants to be - with her.
Its with these odds that they begin their second adventure together. Now with the help of their friends, they scavenge, running away from a reality that looms over them. They get married, they get captured, and when they reach the clear end of their journey - the whole world dropping rain and thunder around them - they're ready to be with each other until the end. They have a leap of faith they have to make together and hope that they'll be okay when they reach the bottom - even though it seems pretty clear they won't be.
"Thank you for marrying me," he tells her.
Everything works out of course, they don't have to make that jump. In the nick of time, the world shows up for them. Not the whole world of course, but the parts of it that matter, the parts that they thought useless or lost that drove them to each other in the first place. And the story ends there, with everyone they care about and each other, happy.
When I proposed to your mother, I strung together this journey in a short abated form. I wanted to remind your Mother that when I saw this movie for the first time, before I'd even known her, it was her I imagined. It was her love that I felt, touching me from the future. And that I was about to solidify it.
And perhaps importantly, we still had struggles in front of us.
Like the characters of Moonrise Kingdom, we were married, far away from the people that perhaps mattered most to us, with the company of Aunt Kelsie, and Elvis. There still amounts in front of us, struggles that we haven't faced yet: age, scars, stress, medical problems, you're attitude as you grow up (knowing your Mother and myself, we have the fiercest little girl ahead of us - for ill and for greatness).
At some points, we see the storm, we see it brewing on the horizon and we stand hand in hand. And sometimes I forget the line I'm supposed to say next. I forget that I'm supposed to look at her in my darkest moments, her darkest moments, our darkest moments and say what's written on my heart.
"Thank you for marrying me."
It echoes through the years, little girl. And I hope that if Moonrise Kingdom doesn't make you feel that way that something, a song, a book, a person, or even us - your parents, happily married, still facing our storms, our darkness, hand in hand, and ready to jump - leaps of faith over every obstacle and problem - and that you realize that not only can Art transcribe onto your heart the most important lessons - but people can too.
You have a long list of people that love you, and I know you'll have a journey to go on too one day, probably for someone you love. And I hope we teach you that there's no better way to do it than against the world - sometimes - and against us - sometimes - and with only the truth on your heart to guide you.
After all, your heart is made of us and I don't know any two people who love you more.
With Love,
Dad
