1991: First Class Stamp $0.29 cents Dr. Jack Kervorkian assisted in medical suicides
Video captures the beating of Rodney King
"Thelma and Louise"
The First Form of Worldwide Web goes online
The Van Gogh Museum recovers 20 paintings stolen
Serial Killers Ailien Wuornos and Jeffrey Dahmer confess
The collapse of The Soviet Union
Freddie Mercury dies in his sleep just 24 hours
after announcing that he had AIDS
"The Silence of the Lambs"
GRUNGE is BORN with Nirvana
Madonna publishes "SEX"
Magic Johnson announced he was HIV-positive.
36,175 AIDS Deaths in the USA
I have told this story many times, as it is one of the best expressions of love I have ever personally experienced. A small story, but a meaningful one to me.
In was December 1991 in Seattle, and J. and I had just finished having dinner at Tup Tum Thai restaurant on Queen Anne. I am sure that included at least Three *** Lemon Grass Soup with shrimp, but what I don't remember is what we were heatedly arguing about. Both of us left the restaurant in a foul mood, angry and not speaking, I am sure all couples can relate. We crossed the street to the other side where our truck was parked, and in doing so walked past an antique store, all decked out with vintage Christmas finery. In icy silence, not a word between us, I remember looking in the window and seeing an angel tree topper. Not your average angel, but exactly the type that was on my Christmas tree as a child. It had been years since I had seen one, and I gasped out loud. It really was nothing special, just a simple die cut angel printed in Germany with gold wings, but what made it special was the Fiberglas rays that reflected the colored bulb behind it and the Fiberglas "cloud" it nestled into. I called J. over to look at it, and told her when I was a child that I thought it was the most beautiful thing in the world, and that the Fiberglas cloud was actually real angel hair. She smiled, and this broke the anger between us, and we left for home feeling a little less stressed with each other.
That Christmas day we celebrated with Marty and Roger, and my last gift was almost forgotten in all of the excitement of the day. Wrapped in a flat paper bag was my angel tree topper from J. I cried and was touched truly beyond words, not because I owned something so precious to me, but because I knew in that very moment I was loved beyond a shadow of a doubt. That J. had gotten past her own anger in the moment to hear the child in me offering a worldless truce, and had loved me in spite of the pettiness we found ourselves in that day. One of the best gifts I ever received, and one for which I am grateful to have experienced.
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