How I Know

Remember when Whitney Houston was adorable? (Let us pause for an awesome '80s flashback.)

Whitney might look bubblegum here, but don't let the huge hair bow fool you. "How Will I Know?" is one of the biggest questions of all.

For each one of us, knowing is a unique process, but it tends to involve the way we feel, the way we laugh, the at-homeness and thrill of it all, and those many and varied things that can't be quantified. (If knowing was as easy as an equation, we wouldn't have pop songs written about it, now would we?)

So there are the big things, but there are also those tiny moments that are as humble as they are full of proclamation. There is me, cooking home alone while he's away on a business trip, digging through the spice box, and discovering a small bag labeled "Homeground Ancho Chile Powder," written in his handwriting, full of chile that he did in fact grind himself.

Someone needs to slap an '80s hair bow on me and call me done, because this little treasure from a guy whose stove had only been used to cook frozen pizza when we met, is in fact how I know.

*Really, I couldn't fit a Whitney Houston/bagged powder joke in here somewhere?