31 years together. 22 years of Sloane Parker.

October, the Annapolis Boat Show. I was 23 and helping out at a friend’s booth. Parker was 27, sunburned, and selling marine hardware two docks down. He walked over to borrow a pen and kept it for three days, so he would have a reason to come back.

He still has that pen, by the way. It lives in the kitchen drawer.

Parker’s job brought us south to Cornelius, North Carolina, a small town on Lake Norman. We bought a brick house with a porch that needed everything, and an old pontoon boat that needed even more.

Sunday mornings on the water with a thermos of coffee started that first summer. We have not missed many since.

After ten years as a pediatric nurse I knew two things. Scrubs are the most comfortable clothes ever made, and nothing in the stores near us felt that easy while still looking put together.

So in September 2004 we opened a tiny white shop by the marina. Parker built the shelves from the planks of an old dock. The first week we sold eleven sweaters, nine of them to people we knew. I was thrilled anyway.

Friends from the lake moved to Florida, Arizona and Ohio, and kept calling to ask for “that sweater, the navy one.” So we started packing boxes at the kitchen island. One box became ten, and ten became a lot more.

Today almost all of Sloane Parker happens online, and I still choose every piece the same way: I feel the fabric, look at the fit on a real body, and ask myself if I would wear it to lunch at the club.

With our youngest almost off to college, I finally said yes to Parker’s Saturday golf. Handicap 26, and proud of it.

Those mornings taught me a lot about clothes. You want to move, you want to stay warm at eight and cool at noon, and you still want to look nice for lunch on the terrace afterwards. Many of our quarter zips and knits come straight out of those Saturdays.

Caroline became a nurse like her mom and moved to Raleigh. Will moved to Atlanta. The house got quiet, so Sunday dinner got bigger: neighbors, friends from the club, whoever comes.

Parker smokes a brisket, I set the table, and somebody always asks where I got my cardigan. You can guess the answer.

This October we celebrate 31 years together and 22 years of Sloane Parker. We still argue about who forgot the sunscreen. We still drink our coffee on the porch. And I still choose every piece in this shop as if it were for me, because most of the time, it is.