December 27 2008
A lot happened last week. Here is part one of how that time went. Thank you to all who were thinking about us during these days.
Five Days. December 22nd - December 26th.
Five significant days.
One of the bookend days is our anniversary. December 22, 1984. 6:30 p.m. Me in a black tux. Man, I look good in a tux. Her in a perfect wedding dress. Perfect because she both made it and looked fantastic in it. It was so her. Elegant. Simple. Breathtaking.
This would have been 24 years. I think I knew that I didn't know what a life-long marriage would be, but I thought I was prepared to find out. Not that I was really prepared though. But how can we be? There are so many components that go into making marriage work. Oh, and it was work. Neither of us came into it with the best examples of commitment on either side of the family. And we each brought our own individual baggage to the terminal. Terminal. One word that both of us chose to avoid with our marriage. We were determined to break the cycle of divorce in our families. My parents, her parents, many other family members. Divorce was rampant (overused word, but precise).
A few words stand out to me in that last paragraph: Chose. Commitment. Determined. Work. Notice the missing phrases, 'felt so in love', 'so many things in common', 'for the kids'.
What led to all the work? A series of stupid mindsets and selfish choices on my part and some unforgiveness and unrealistic expectations on hers led us to counseling. With not much hope. Commitment to at least stay together, but with maybe a relationship more akin to “married singles” to borrow a phrase. How's that for a rosy future?
After a decade of counseling, (I told you it was work) we had come to a new relationship. A couple of years after that and we had fallen into good patterns, had become accustomed to making wiser choices and doling out forgiveness freely. Not perfect. But so completely different than what we had before, that I have never been able to adequately describe how transformationally new it was. Even that still inadequately describes it.
What we had worked the relationship into, was the relationship people saw for the last three years. And it was just as good as it looked. Often people act like things are fine in front of other people, not just for our pride, but to save others from some uncomfortable situations too. We had done that way too much for way too many years.
Our relationship recently was not perfect. We were still out of sorts with each other at times. Just that now I made more selfless choices and she forgave so quickly. I'm not saying we had arrived as the epitome of the model couple.
But it was great.. The best three years of my life.
So on our anniversary, which had the potential to be the hardest of the days, I had a great day. Of course, part of that was because of the preparations being made for the kids to arrive from the states. But it wasn't just that. Remembering that day in Paris, TX brought some great feelings with the memories, not much sadness. Joy at what happened the day we got married.
In fact some days are magical.
I got out of the bus at the downtown square at exactly 7 p.m. It is one of my favorite places in Kunming, some of my favorite China memories have happened there, like when during the Olympics in August, I stood in the midst of 3000 people in my current country and celebrated when the Chinese weightlifter won the gold medal. 24 years ago, it was almost exactly at 7:00 when she said "I Do". So in Kunming last week, at that moment, I was standing there, experiencing the sounds, the lights, the crisp air, the memories. And it was peace-filled, quiet, deep-current joy. Silent smiles. Breathing in the moments. Not hard at all. Far from it.
Then the kids arrived that night.
Later when everyone had gone to bed, I had hot chocolate nestling in my belly, and that cool, little kid sleepy setting in. All six kids together again. Hugs and laughter and quiet giddiness. (How's that for an oxymoron?) No tears, and that's ok too.
It made for a glorious day.
No comments:
Post a Comment