Romance

This month is our celebration month. Both me and my husband have birthdays. It's also our wedding anniversary month. As you get older, birthdays make you reflect alot on the past, on yourself, and make you think about your blessings, your experiences through life, and the future. Next year I'll be 40 years old. I'm still in my 30's. I still think of myself as 'young'. One more year left in my 'youth'. But next year . . . well, I'll be 40.
I've heard that the older you get the more realistic about the world and life you become. Maybe that is true. But I don't want to lose romance. I don't want to lose idealism. I don't want to lose that feeling you have when you're truly young that you can do anything - that life is endless.

Wedding anniversaries make you think about relationships. And it has made me realize how incredibly blessed I am in my marriage. How so very grateful I am to God that He has blessed me with the experience of knowing what is true love between a man and a woman with my husband - a love that grows and deepens each year.

We've been celebrating our marriage this week - after 13 years together I am blessed to own that I am more in love with my husband now than I was at our wedding. How does that happen? Back then it was new, exciting, a lifetime ahead of us like an empty book. When I look at photos of me at my wedding, in my bridal dress, young and fresh faced, we didn't know then what was ahead of us. Would we have chosen to marry knowing the hardships that lay before us - the miscarriage, the difficult pregnancies and births, the sadness that comes with dealing with a chronic condition in one of our children, the financially difficult times, the tragedies around us that happen to our family and friends? The petty little annoyances, the uncertainties, the aging, the lines on our faces that weren't there 13 years ago, and the gray hairs, the imperfect bodies, the responsibilities, the self-sacrifice, the giving in to each other? Would we have chosen marriage? Then I ask myself this:

Would I only ask for tears of joy in my life? Would I only ask that no sorrow touch our lives? Would I only ask that no sadness fill our hearts? To deny that would be to deny the joy of love and companionship too.
While I don't ask for the sorrow or the hardships, I could not be without them. To be without them would mean to be without the man I love and the children God has given us.
With the tears of sorrow come also the tears of joy.

Having someone who loves you - even if no one else does. That makes a good marriage worth it. Going through life together, finding little things to laugh at, taking comfort in the familiarity of the mundane, remembering the little family jokes and sayings and mannerisms. The secret smiles across the table at each other when one of the children says something funny. Long, private analytic talks about ourselves, our neighbours, our friends, our acquantainces. Watching tv together, going for moonlit walks together down to the gate to collect the rubbish bin. Romance survives even among the prosaic things of this life.
Watching him do little things for me at the end of the day like the vaccuming. Asking me to mend his favourite shorts. Planning holidays. Having him fill up the car with petrol for me (I hate doing that)! Seeing young couples holding hands in public places and feeling content that 13 years down the track we still do that too.

Yes, we've had a good week. A good week of celebrating the ordinariness of marriage, and the extraordinariness of a deep romance that lasts a lifetime. I thank God for my husband and for the oneness of spirit that we share. Here's to the next 13 years and beyond, my darling.