So I bought an antique typewriter (turns out it’s from the 1930s) because I learned to type on a typewriter when I was a kid and lived in Turkey, and I’m a writer, and I just thought it would be cool to have one in my office. I thought I’d take it to a repair person or just ask Navy Guy to clean it up.

This was at Halloween.

Within a few weeks, it looked like this, and then it got worse and worse and worse, till it was broken down into a million pieces: 

But I know Navy Guy. So I waited.

And waited.

And waited.

And he turned himself into an expert on typewriter repair.

And then he turned himself into an expert on typewriter restoration

And yesterday, after four months, countless hours, a meticulous repair that included cleaning and polishing each tiny bit, hand-sewing new felt, and coating the thing in museum quality micro-crystalline wax (because of course he did), my better-than-new typewriter has pride of place in my office–and it works like new, too!

Love that guy.

Sometimes, true love isn’t about flowers and candy and mushy cards (although he gives me those, too). Sometimes, true love is about changing the oil in your car, or cleaning the kitchen, or staying up all night with a sick kid so you can rest.

Because love takes so many, many forms, and at its truest, it’s about caring for someone else and cherishing that person enough to put their needs before your own.

Navy Guy missed a lot of hours of doing the things that he wanted to do–watching TV, reading, puttering out in the yard–to make this typewriter gleam for me.

Sometimes true love is about hand-sewing felt and micro-crystalline wax.

Sometimes true love is about typewriter repair.