Three years ago, at six o’clock this evening, Daniel and I stood among our family and friends and pledged to be two for the road.
We started our marriage somewhat naively, just as other couples. We had immeasurable infatuation, immense love, and a raging desire to prove to the other that we would go to the end of the world for each other.
None of those things are necessarily bad, of course.
After we’d been married for about a year and a half, I remember feeling overwhelmed one day because suddenly I realized we weren’t in the crazy infatuation stage any longer. It felt wrong.
For a time, I mourned our honeymoon days, where we could barely breathe in the same room without giggling and blushing.
But as the mourning passed, I realized something more beautiful than I could have imagined. We were still madly in love. But the infatuation had changed into a calming and assuring realization that simply being together was the constant as everything around us changed daily (including ourselves).
We still have the passion. Thank God we have the passion. 😉 But on the days or weeks when passion seems the farthest thing from our minds (days when throw up is on the wall, poo is in the carpet, or we’re bone tired), I no longer worry that the best of our marriage is behind us.
The best is delightfully ahead.
This lovely poem (found in The Many Loves of Marriage) was the theme of our wedding and still is the theme of our marriage.
Picture two backpackers, setting out on a journey.
As well as they are able, they have prepared themselves for the long trek. They’re excited. They’re also inexperienced, untested, unproven, and just a little bit scared. Yet they have the essentials. They have a good compass. They have provisions. And they have each other.
The problem is, they have no idea at all where their path will lead. They have a vague notion that there will be long climbs, beautiful vistas, deep canyons, long desert stretches, and swift rivers. Although bright sunlight will occasionally warm their shoulders, they also sense (however dimly) that rain will follow, the wind will blow, and snow may cover the trail.
At the same time, they can also appreciate the fact that each of them will change on this journey – as surely as the terrain transforms beneath their feet. Dark nights, heavy loads, long winds, and the heat of the day have a way of shaping one’s soul. They will begin to see things through new eyes. They will find a pace that suits them both. They will adjust to weaknesses – whether of bone or sinew, or of the heart. They will develop attitudes and attributes significantly different from the way they viewed things at the trailhead.
But as the miles fall behind and the months and years slip by, they will continue to walk side by side. Sometimes helping each other across streams or up steep, rocky inclines, they maintain their long journey…into the unknown.
The landscapes alters dramatically. Storms rage and pass on. Wildflowers bloom and wither. Seasons pass. Companions on the trail come and go. And the hikers themselves adjust and grow through each experience, each amazing vista, each encounter with hardship and danger.
And they stay together.
Step for step, Day by day. Year after year. Their companionship is a constant as everything else changes. When one stumbles, the other is quick with a helping hand. When one becomes weary, the other shoulders two loads for a few miles. They weather the storms. They take shelter in each other’s arms. They experience high country panoramas when life unfolds before them, shining like a rain-washed highway in the morning sun. Nothing, but nothing, drives them apart. Nothing short of death divides their path.
Two for the road, no matter where that road may lead.
I love you, Daniel.
I am so blessed that we are man and wife, and that you are with me on this journey.
Awwww! Congratulations!!!
congratulations, y’all lovebirds:). may the years ahead of you be better than the ones behind you!