Baby

My Baby,

Happy Birthday to the girl who turned side roads into our favorite memories.

I don't think I ever really loved bike rides before you — the wind, the getting-a-little-lost, the stopping wherever looked pretty and staying longer than we'd planned. Somewhere between the ghats and the coast, the temple towns whose names I still can't pronounce right, and every beach we swore we'd remember the way back to — I stopped just enjoying the rides. I started living for them, because you were on the back of that bike with me.

You've turned an ordinary map into a hundred small adventures. Every road we've explored down south, every random stop just because the view looked too good to pass, every sunset we almost missed because we were too busy talking — all of it is ours now. That's what I love most about loving you: even the simplest days with you feel like something worth remembering forever.

That's part of why I picked out a diamond for you this year — nothing smaller felt like it could hold how precious you actually are to me. You're a little bit of a devil, honestly, and somehow I'm the only one who can put up with you — which just tells me we were built for each other. I don't know how I ended up the luckiest person on earth, loving someone like you, but I did, and I'm never taking that for granted.

So today, I just want you to know — however far the road goes, however many more places we haven't found yet, I want to keep riding it with you. Happy Birthday, my love. Here's to many more miles, many more stops we didn't plan, and a whole lot more of us.

I love you, today and every day.

— Your Baby