Marriage

Things You Should Never Text Your Husband

Last weekend I went with Christina to her cousin’s birthday party at a cool restaurant in downtown Raleigh. While I was there I received a text message from a friend who got married a few months ago. The text contained a picture of a positive pregnancy test. I was really excited for her, and also amazed at how quickly they’d gotten pregnant since they’d only been married a short time. I forwarded the picture to Jonathan along with a message that said, “Well…I guess they decided not to waste any time! I just got this text from ‘Monica.’ ” (name changed to protect the innocent.) Then I stuck my phone back in my coat pocket and kept chatting with everyone. About 15 minutes later I realized I never heard back and pulled my phone out again. No messages. I left it on the table and continued with dinner. About three minutes later, my phone started buzzing in uncontrollable spasms. You know when you are in an area with no signal for a while and then you connect again and all the stuff that’s been sent the whole time you were out of signal comes through all at once? Well, that is exactly what had happened. Apparently, back in my coat pocket, things hadn’t been going through. I looked at the screen to find three texts and about 10 missed calls from Jonathan. For a minute I thought, “Geez, why is he so worked up about this…it’s not really even his friend.” Then I looked at the text exchange and found that what I thought I had sent had not all gone through. This is what he had received:

I am in soooo much trouble...

 

Needless to say, the man wanted to kill me. I tried to talk him down, explaining that I would never just joke with him like that. That I was so sorry. That obviously I would never tell him that I was pregnant via text message and that I would also never take a pregnancy test while out to eat with friends. That I should have thought it through and should never have sent that message in the first place. That I was the worst wife ever. His response, “Are you completely insane?!” And later, “Do not ever send me something like that again!” On Friday night, our marriage was on shaky ground. To all my girls out there, married or not, learn from my mistake. Never send your husband a text message with a picture of a positive pregnancy test on it! Or an email even, probably. Oh, technology…how you have failed me.

So the weekend started out not quite as expected what with the panic and rage, etc. but Saturday morning dawned very sunny and promising (although also quite cold and windy.) We put on all of our cool running gear in which we look awesome and very professional: running tights, shorts over tights (Christina),knee brace (me and Jonathan), long sleeved shirt, jacket, arm-band for carrying iPod, fleece headband that covers your ears, socks, running shoes, and those cool knit gloves with the special fingertips where you can still use your touch-screen phone while wearing. We were decked out. I wish I had a picture so you could behold us in all of our awesomeness. And it is a good thing too because that wind was COLD! But all three of us succeeded in running our first 11-miler with no walk breaks, just occasional stops for water. I can’t stress enough what an accomplishment this was for all three of us. We are not runners. Any of us. And yet, in just four months we have gone from running ¾ mile and then nearly puking or passing out (at least that was me back in September) to doing a 2hr, 11-mile run. I am amazed at the human body. (Although somehow, despite being in the uncontested best shape of my life, I’m still hanging onto those 10 lbs that have tipped me over the edge of my “healthy weight range” and into “overweight, but not yet obese” range. But that’s another story.)

In celebration of our amazing accomplishment we went to Outback and used a Christmas gift card to eat a large amount of Bloomin’ Onion, steak, baked potatoes and Caesar salad. Yum. (Perhaps now understanding those lingering 10 lbs…) We went home and had a relaxing, uneventful night.

Sunday morning, Jonathan wakes up in horrible pain all over his stomach and back. At first we think it is food poisoning, but after a few hours we realize it’s something more than that. Eventually I take him to Urgent Care hoping they can do something for him. The man is in so much pain it is all I can do not to burst into tears, but, knowing that wouldn’t be the least bit helpful I instead make a lot of un-funny jokes. It’s something I’ve always hated about myself-that in a medical crisis I get so upset I feel the only way to keep myself from exploding with grief (not helpful) is to crack corny jokes (equally not helpful.) Eventually the doctor tells us it is either a kidney stone or the early stages of appendicitis and we go home to wait and see. Thankfully, a few hours later it becomes clear that it is not appendicitis and after drinking what seems like several gallons of fluids, Jonathan starts to feel better. We are so thankful that Jonathan is more or less back to normal with only a few residual side effects.

I have heard from multiple sources that kidney stones are one of the most painful things the human body can experience. Most say it is the closest equivalent men can experience to childbirth and some women who have been through both even rank kidney stones as the more intense pain. I feel horrible that Jonathan had to go through that. But I know that one day, a few years from now, when that positive pregnancy test is mine, I will be reminding him of what this felt like. And I will probably point out the fact that he was only dealing with something smaller than a dried pea. While I will be dealing with something the size of a small watermelon.  But don’t worry, I probably won’t tell him any of that in a text message.

Kidney stone. Not Jonathan’s. Ew.
Approximate size of baby…though probably heavier than a baby…I hope

 

Marriage and Other Miracles

I’ve been trying to blog for days (and days and days) and everything keeps coming out jumbled and messy and I am facing a complete inability to think linearly. Instead all of my thoughts come in bursts and flashes that I can’t quite manage to capture and organize. So the options are to wait until I’ve ironed things out neatly and can present them one at a time like so many articles of clothing folded just so inside my drawer. Or I can go with the jumbled mess, something more like the pile of unsorted, dirty laundry sitting in the hamper. And on top of it. And on the bathroom floor. Which I suppose is truer anyway.

Last weekend we went to Indiana for the wedding of some dear friends of ours. The wedding was sweet and fun and I loved being able to share in the joy of our friends as they began married life. Weddings are a different experience for me now that I am married. In one sense, I feel more joy and excitement for the couple as I know what it is they are stepping into and what they have to look forward to. But I am also always struck with a sense of awe, understanding that I am witnessing a miracle, or rather the beginning of one. I don’t exactly believe that in the moment of the wedding ceremony, you magically become one, but I do believe that through the process of marriage your hearts are knit together in an inexplicable way. Somehow two people who didn’t even know the other existed a matter of years ago become a family. It’s beautiful to witness in someone else and it’s astounding to experience for yourself.

There’s so much of the daily parts of marriage that seem unremarkable, but I never want to forget that every day I am living out part of a miracle. It’s why I wrote the words of my wedding vows so carefully, “Jonathan I love you. I choose you today and every day as my husband, my helper, and my best friend…” The miracle is not just that I fell in love with him when I was nineteen. And it isn’t just that I spoke those vows to him one day last June. The miracle is also that I wrote these same words across my bathroom mirror with a dry erase marker just last week. It’s that when I come home from work at night he wraps his arms around me in a hug so big it lifts me up off of the floor. It’s that I chose him on my wedding day and I chose him when I woke up this morning. That I will choose him tomorrow and that I will choose him on the day I die. The miracle is God giving two sinful, unfaithful people the measure of grace necessary to choose this kind of faithfulness on a daily basis. The miracle is that after being together for nearly five years and married for more than one, I am still in awe that I get to choose him.

I recently started a new job in a large office full of new people. It’s been a challenge to not only learn about the work itself but to try to get to know the people working around me. Everyone has been very nice to me, but it’s hard not to feel isolated in my little cube while I listen to the other girls making lunch plans, talking about hanging out on the weekends and visiting each others’ cubes where they whisper and laugh. One thing I’ve noticed though is how rarely they talk about their husbands or boyfriends in a positive light. It seems that all that they have to say about them is something stupid they’ve done or how annoying they are. Of course, I don’t believe for a minute that this is all they feel about their husbands/boyfriends, but I wonder why it is that it’s so much easier for people talk about their spouse’s shortcomings than to talk about their good qualities.

I think it has to do with the view of marriage that is so prevalent in western culture. That marriage exists to make us happy. If this is the point of marriage, then it follows that people are intolerant of anything that makes them unhappy in their marriage. If the success of a marriage is measured in happiness and the only obligation people feel is towards their own happiness, it’s no wonder so many marriages end in divorce. If marriage is seen as something primarily self-serving it will ultimately fail.

Marriage is about becoming more holy. It is a partnership that spurs one another towards holiness. It is about laying down your life for someone else. It is about showing love and grace and compassion and forgiveness even when you don’t feel like it. It is about encouraging, speaking words of life instead of words of destruction, putting someone else’s interests before your own. The “happiness” of marriage flows out of the security of having someone who chooses to love you unconditionally, not out of your total agreement with every word that comes from their mouth or how they handle every situation. It is the overwhelming certainty of having someone who will not leave you when they grow tired of you and will not turn to someone else when they are discontent.

Living out this kind of self-sacrificing, intensely faithful marriage is impossible for a human. But nothing is impossible for God, and He is willing to share that power with us. And that, too, is a miracle.

 

Just for fun, a few of my favorite pics from our wedding as photographed by the lovely and talented Asharae Brundin Kroll and Taylor Horton. (If you need a photographer, hire one of them. They are excellent and they travel.)

Us under the huppah my brother built, being married by David Henderson

Soooo married!

This is how I feel everytime I kiss him. Only I'm not that skinny anymore. 🙂

 

My necklace from etsy and the bouquet my matron of honor, Lanise Guidry, made for me

We're so cute, they didn't know what to do with themselves.

Please, no more pictures!

 

I Sing of Gratitude

Today I am celebrating.  The sun is shining, the breeze is gentle, the daffodils popping up everywhere and as of today, I have been married to the most wonderful man in the world for ten months.  Amazing.

People are always saying that the first year of marriage is the hardest…if that’s true then we are going to have the easiest life ever. : ) I credit Jonathan greatly for the easiness of our transition into marriage. His graciousness, his ability to let go of things quickly, and his willingness to be flexible have made what were potentially dozens of conflicts into just a handful.  After almost a year, we still enjoy being together, we fight less than we did before we were married, and we laugh all the time.

I don’t and will not ever pretend that we have a perfect marriage or that we know how to do everything just right, but I do recognize some things that we are doing right and I think it’s worthwhile to look at something and say, “This is good.” The thing that stands out to me the most as I reflect on our married life is an attitude of thankfulness.

Without having ever discussed it or made a collective decision to do so, we thank each other all the time. Even for the tiniest, most insignificant things we do as a matter of routine. Thank you for making the bed this morning. Thank you for making dinner. Thank you for unloading the dishwasher. Thank you for cleaning the litter box. Thank you for hanging up my coat. Even if I’m not at home, I’ll get a text that says, “Thanks for doing the laundry yesterday!”

All this thanking might seem silly or a bit like overkill, but I think it makes a world of difference in our attitudes toward each other. When I feel appreciated for the things I do, even the everyday mundane things, I don’t resent doing them. And I’m not saying it never happens, but it’s hard to be frustrated or irritated with someone when you are in the habit focusing on the ways that they bless you. When you truly see each other as a gift, you are so much more willing to put in the hard work of communicating, compromising, and showing love unconditionally.

As I’ve been thinking about what thankfulness means in my marriage, I’ve also started to think more about what it means for the rest of my life. Or, I suppose more accurately, what it could mean. If a spirit of gratitude in my marriage has made these last ten months so overwhelmingly joyful, what could the rest of my life look like if I looked at it from the perspective of thankfulness? If I stopped resenting the fact that I have to play with small children for 8 hrs a day , the fact that I can’t eat whatever I want without consequences, or the fact that I still don’t know what I want to be when I grow up.

Several years ago I read an essay called “A Country Road Song” by Andre Dubus from his collection, Meditations from a Movable Chair. It is one of the most beautiful and moving pieces I’ve ever read and it deals directly with this theme of gratefulness.  A little background on Dubus (note, this Andre Dubus I, not Andre Dubus II his son who is also a writer)–he grew up in Lafayette, LA, my hometown (woo-hoo!) but lived much of his later life in Massachusetts. One evening when Dubus was 49 years old, he stopped on the side of the road to help a man and woman having car trouble. Another motorist swerved and hit them, killing the other man and crushing both of Dubus’ legs. He later had his left leg amputated and lost all use of his right leg. Dubus had been an avid runner before his accident. This essay is primarily about his memories of running through all the different seasons. I wish you could read the entire essay, but I’ll try to choose the best passages.

” When I ran, when I walked, there was no time: there was only my body, my breath, the trees and hills and sky…I always felt grateful, but I did not know it was gratitude and so I never thanked God. Eight years ago, on a starlight night in July, a car hit me…and in September a surgeon cut off my left leg… It is now time to sing of my gratitude:for legs and hills and trees and seasons…I mourn this, and I sing in gratitude for loving this, and in gratitude for all the roads I ran on and walked on, for the hills I climbed and descended, for trees and grass and sky, and for being spared losing running and walking sooner than I did: ten years sooner, or eight seasons, or three; or one day.”

I cry everytime I read this because it overwhelms me that a man could feel and express this intense gratitude in the very face of such incredible loss. What would my life look like if I understood what this man did? What would this world look like if we chose gratitude over resentment and joy over sorrow? It literally takes my breath away to imagine.

Burn Out

I think I have finally reached the point of total and complete burnout as far as my job is concerned. After months of struggling with a sense of purpose in what I’m doing and some frustration with the monotony of it, I’ve finally reached a point where even the weekends aren’t enough recuperation and nothing seems to encourage me. While I genuinely do love the kids I am with, I am tired all of the time and I am bored out of my mind. I am completely out of patience and feel that I cannot answer one more question. Except for naptime in the afternoon, I spend 7-8 hours a day entertaining and verbally responding to a preschooler and a toddler and half of that is correcting, cajoling, convincing, rebuking, or coming up with creative and interesting things for them to do. I’m worn out. I’m committed to this job until the end of May. Intellectually, I know that’s not forever. But right now, it feels like forever. And every morning when my alarm goes off everything in me screams, “NO!”

Jonathan and I continue to wait for good news from the schools he’s applied to, but so far there hasn’t been any. We’ve begun to discuss where we’ll go and what we’ll do if school isn’t on the table for next year. It’s somewhat exciting to think about moving somewhere new based on nothing more than an interest in the location, but it can also be overwhelming and frightening. Mostly though I am frustrated and feel defeated. I am so tremendously proud of my husband for applying to these programs that are highly selective and are evaluating your creative work which is often so deeply personal. I think he is so brave for pursuing something like this and it took a lot for him to even allow himself to pursue it simply because he felt it was impractical. I am frustrated with God because I don’t understand why he would have given him this dream and given him the courage to pursue it if it isn’t even going to work out.  And I feel completely at a loss as to how to encourage him in the midst of this. I don’t know how to make him believe that whatever the outcome, he is tremendously talented and gifted and that I respect and admire what he’s done so much. Just saying the words doesn’t seem to be enough.

I also had a tremendously selfish conversation with my husband in the midst of all of this where I whined about not being seen as a writer or taken seriously for my writing. It was juvenile and pathetic and the truth remains that I have not produced anything new creatively in almost a year. This is my own fault. No one sees me as a writer because, well, I don’t write.

So friends, this isn’t a witty, endearing, or uplifting blog post, but it is an honest post. I feel like I am failing. I am failing as a nanny. I am failing at being an encouraging, supportive wife. I am failing as a writer. I feel empty. Like I have nothing left to give. But this one promise keeps echoing through my mind. A voice that says, “My grace is sufficient for you. My strength is made perfect in your weakness.”

Weight Watching

Last Tuesday I joined Weight Watchers. Things have gotten out of hand (and by “things” I mean, me). Just promising myself I’d eat better wasn’t cutting it. Throwing in some exercise wasn’t cutting it. I needed a plan and I needed to be held accountable. I’ll admit, I felt very self-conscious when I walked through the door. I was thinking to myself, ” People who go to weight watchers are in their 50’s and are obese. I am going to feel so out of place.” I felt pretty uncomfortable doing it, but I opened the door and went in and launched myself into a new lifestyle.

I know I set this up to sound like I was completely wrong about Weight Watchers being the hangout of women of a certain age and a certain build. Actually, I was pretty spot-on. I attended my first meeting and of the more than 50 women present I was one of about 10 who looked younger than 40 and one of about 4 who looked younger than 30.  What did surprise me was how much I enjoyed the meeting in spite of that. It was such a non-judgmental environment. No one cared that I’ve gone up three pants sizes in the last 8 months, not did anyone look at me and say, “Oh, you’re so young and skinny, you don’t need to be here!” (which sounds like a nice thing to say, but can be very frustrating when your good enough at excusing yourself without someone else’s help.) They accepted that I was one of them, a woman seeking to take care of her body and live and healthy lifestyle, and for that I was embraced.

I am a week into this journey and have done well so far, largely due to a book I read over the past week. It’s called Made to Crave and deals with developing and sustaining the godly desire to be healthy and to keep food in it’s proper place in our lives. The author talks about using the apostle Paul’s words, “Everything is permissable for me, but not everything is beneficial,” as a guide and I can honestly say that I find it very helpful. I am often tempted (about food or anything else I know I shouldn’t do)  to feel that it’s just not fair that I can’t just have or do what I want, but this verse really changes my perspective. No one’s restricting me. I’m allowed to eat whatever I want. I am just making a choice that’s more beneficial. I think my mother would say that is called maturity. Ha.

I have come to realize that one of the reasons I’ve been struggling so much in this area over the past few months has to do with my adjustment to marriage. I have an overwhelming desire to be an amazing wife. I don’t just want to be good and loving, I want my husband to feel love oozing out of every piece of housework I do and every meal I cook. I deeply desire for my husband to think I am the best cook, the best homemaker, the best lover, the best friend, etc he could ever have imagined. The truth is…I am just me…and my husband already thinks all of these things are true. But that doesn’t stop me from feeling like I have to earn them sometimes. Consequently, I put a lot of pressure on myself most nights to create either elaborate meals, or at least meals that I know my husband really enjoys. The problem is, my husband’s favorite foods are delicious, but also tend to be pretty unhealthy. Even though I know intellectually it is better for both of us if I don’t make fettucine alfredo and stuffed potato skins every night, I so crave his praise that I had been unable to make a change.

One afternoon last week as I left work Sami called after me, “Goodbye, Lily! And you be good to Jonathan!” She cracks me up. I thought, “Of course I’ll be good to Jonathan. Goofball. I try all the time to be good to Jonathan.” Today I am thinking, maybe actually being good to Jonathan means not always doing the thing that will earn me the most praise. Maybe it means doing the thing that will truly be best for him and for myself, even if it doesn’t make him jump for joy. It amazes me how often I do things out of selfishness, even when I think my motives are completely other-centered.

So…here’s a new chapter in my life. A journey towards a healthier life, for my body and for my spirit.

I look marvelous!

This week is an exciting/nervewracking one for us. My husband has applied to 9 grad schools in the hopes of doing an MFA in creative writing beginning Fall 2011. After months and months of research and work, we are finally entering the season where we start to hear back from the schools he applied to. If he gets accepted at Ohio State, we expect to hear sometimes this week/weekend. From there we will hear from the other 8 schools gradually over the next 6-8 weeks. It’s exciting to finally be at this point, but my stomach (and I’m sure his even more so) has just been in knots as we get closer and closer to knowing. I think the thing that makes this so nervewracking (as I am sure anyone who has gone through any kind of application process can testify) is that we have absolutely no control over the outcome, despite my husband having put a tremendous amount of time and energy into it.

This is the point at which I will tell people/myself that I have to just trust God and know that His will will be done, but more and more lately I really wonder what it means or what it would look like to trust God and His will. In a sense I feel like it’s easy to say that you are trusting God because whatever is going to happen is going to happen and then you can just try to content yourself by saying that whatever the result was, it must have been God’s will. But what would it be like to really rest in the knowledge that God is in control of the situation instead of just using “God’s will” as a way to comfort ourselves if things don’t go as we imagined they would?

At the core of this I see the real issue being a matter of contentment in and with whatever situation we are in. This is something I admittedly lack much of the time. I find it very difficult to stop myself from constantly looking forward to the next big thing. In high school I couldn’t wait to go to college. In college I couldn’t wait to graduate and get married and not be in classes anymore. Now I can’t wait to move from this cold, cold place and find a “real” job instead of nannying. At each phase there is always something else to be looking towards. I recognize that this is a never-ending cycle and that there will never really be a point at which I’ve arrived, and yet I have not yet learned to be present in the moments that I am given every day. To be present in the job I am doing, or in the activities I’m involved in, or in my conversations with those around me. I am constantly distracted by what I would like to do later…in a new season of life, next week, or even just later that day. Yet, God sends me reminders every day of the blessings I’ve been given and the need to be fully present and content with where I am and what I am doing. Perhaps contentment with the present is as much a sign of faith as any other.

For Christmas Sami receive a pack of chapsticks that are all different soda flavors/colors. She has root beer, vanilla coke, cherry soda, grape soda, and orange soda and she insists on layering them all one over the other when she wears them. She also never seems to get the chapstick onto her lips, instead spreading it artfully in a large sticky circle all around her mouth. Yesterday morning she bounded downstairs smelling strongly of artificial grape and cherry flavor with a sticky rainbow ring around her mouth. She grinned up at me, “I put on some chapstick,” she said. “I see that,” I told her. “I look marvelous!” she stated. She didn’t even need me to affirm this.

How simple. To take such delight in putting on chaptstick and to accept wholeheartedly that doing so made her look marvelous. I too want to remember what it is like to delight in such small things and to feel that something as insignificant as putting on my chapstick has meaning and worth. I too want to look marvelous.