“All the Days of My Life” – a guest post by my husband, Chris

“All the Days of My Life” – a guest post by my husband, Chris

This post was re-published in October 2019 to celebrate the 5th Anniversary of this blog, Like the Dewfall. For another post on lifelong love, please see this one about my dear grandparents Hazel and Allen Smith, who were married for 75 years before passing on within 5 weeks of one another: “What Makes A Couple Truly Beautiful?”

Original Post:

Today – May 23, 2018 – my husband Chris and I celebrate our 20th wedding anniversary. About a month ago, I asked my beloved if he’d like to write something about marriage for my blog to mark this occasion, and I was delighted when he said yes. The final product is a gift that exceeded all of my hopes and expectations, and I am both humbled and overjoyed to be sharing it with you.

 

All the days of my life

In our first week of dating, attending an inaugural ball for President Clinton’s second inauguration. January 1997.

The first 7,304

It never occurred to me that marrying Gretchen was a choice.  Truly, it was no more a decision than it was whether to draw another breath.  I suppose I could have put it off, but then I’d eventually pass out and start again.  Breathing that is.  But you get the point.

We were engaged ten months after our first date and wed six months later. It didn’t seem fast because marrying her was the most natural thing I have ever done.  I had also been brought up to believe that’s how it should be. Blessed to be born into a family overrun with happy marriages, my mother used say that “you just know it when you know it.”  It was a uniquely unsatisfying, irretrievably irrational and absolutely accurate piece of wisdom, and I never doubted.

I gave little real thought to how “just knowing it” would feel.  But when I fell in love with Gretchen, I remember having a sense of peace that I hadn’t known before.  It was the kind of serenity that comes when you flow effortlessly in the stream of life.  I recall thinking calmly to myself,

“So this is her. The love of my life.  I knew she’d be smart.  Glad she’s pretty. Figured she’d be blonde.”

And I exhaled, as if I had been holding a small measure of my breath for the better part of 24 years.

Of course we did have some difficulties which were also learning experiences.  To this day, our biggest fight came as newlyweds setting up our first apartment.  The Great Spice Rack Dispute will live on in family lore for decades to come.  Well it should as a tale rife with lessons about life.

The facts of the matter, as stipulated by the parties, are these: Gretchen wanted the spice rack concealed in a cabinet so the kitchen wouldn’t look messy.  I preferred the spices visible and within arm’s reach.  Needless to say, it’s a miracle our marriage survived.

I recollect nothing of what was said but I remember it being explosive, at least by our standards.  I think I even left the condo that night, coming back a little later.  After all, my magnificent dog, Crash, was still there.

When the dust settled, we spoke about what had happened.  It turns out that Gretchen was actually not arguing about the spice rack’s precise location. Instead, I learned that she had a lifetime of plans and ideas about how to create a home; that these notions were an extension of her identity; that our disagreement seemingly threatened our very being as well as endangering all manner of critically important, authentically valid, truly emotional and deeply-held thoughts about herself, me and our new life together.

And for my part, I was arguing about where to put the spice rack.

May 23, 1998.

An important lesson to this day, I understand that the real cause of most conflicts usually has little to do with the ostensible terms of the debate.  That is, it’s easy to confuse the symptom with the illness and growth in our marriage has usually come from focusing on underlying issues.

That said, we have developed a few everyday strategies to avoid unnecessary flare-ups.  These include:

  1. No discussing anything after 10pm. Not the kids, not tomorrow’s schedule, not rainbows, not unicorns.  No matter how seemingly innocuous, a late day conversation is about 500 times more likely to end poorly and/or stupidly.
  2. No mind reading. And no demands for telepathy.  We try not to conjure up each other’s thoughts and if we want something, we need to say it.
  3. Always assume the best intentions. We want the best for each other.  Our frustrations are usually borne of a lack of understanding rather than an absence of love.
  4. No quinoa. Ever.  I’ve forgiven Gretchen for knowingly eating Grape Nuts, but there’s a limit.  Quinoa is bad for a marriage, your soul and for America.

Most importantly, over the years we’ve found that approximately 99.3% of our issues are not between us as a couple, but within us as individuals.  Gretchen brings out my better qualities, but she doesn’t rid me of my flaws.  I still bring me into every situation.

That’s one of the many reasons spiritual growth has become part of our life together.  We don’t always approach it in the same way, nor do we have to.  For instance, Gretchen is a Catholic convert.  Her kind can be found singing during Mass and probably sitting upfront being all attentive and holy.  On the other hand, I was raised Philadelphia Irish Catholic, so my brand of religion involves telling jokes during funerals.

Such superficialities aside, we both care deeply about growing personally and growing as a couple.  Early on, especially when we were finding our own way, we stepped on each other a few times.   But we have accepted that our spiritual paths run alongside each other, each meandering at its own pace, sometimes crossing, sometimes in parallel, always moving the same direction. And that works for us.

When reflecting on marriage, it’s easy to dwell on the bumps in the road.  I think doing so misses the joy in it all. After all, perfection is a fine thought, but it means that there is no further growth, no greater joy, nothing more to be revealed. I’m in no hurry.

The fact is that our problems are really just challenges, and our challenges are really just worries. The worries, trifles.  Job stress, busy schedules, not enough time for all the people we care about.  Each and every one just a reflection of some wonderful blessing in our lives.

I often need to remind myself of that great truth and to bask in profound gratitude for having been given such a beautiful, intelligent, loving woman with whom I can greet life.  Gretchen is my greatest blessing.

When we married, I promised to love and honor Gretchen all the days of my life. Great days do adorn our past, but the best lay yet ahead.  And as each has passed over the last twenty years, I remain forever overwhelmed.

Thankful Little Boy: Letting Gratitude Live

Thankful Little Boy: Letting Gratitude Live

The small voice spoke from the silence of the back seat.

“I am thankful for Mike.”

“I’m sorry, Honey. What did you say?”

“I’m thankful for Mike. He told me how to get the cars on.”

“Which cars?”

“The new ones. For my Anki Overdrive. I didn’t know how to get them on right and he told me today at lower lot. I’m so thankful for him.”

“Oh. Oh yes, that was certainly nice of him. So, you’re thankful for him, and his friendship.”

“Yes.”

End of discussion.

I looked in the rear view mirror to see my little boy smiling to himself.

My son received a car and track system from Santa at Christmas, and got a couple new components for his eighth birthday this past weekend. I didn’t know he had any questions about how these supplementary pieces would work, because he never had questions before. But with kids, sometimes things are hidden from you.

In any case, he has a friend. A friend who helped him. Gave him a few directions while they stood in line, waiting for their parents to pick them up from school.

And my young son is vocalizing his gratitude about that friendship.

Letting his gratitude LIVE in his heart, and not be a fleeting moment of forgotten, “Thanks.”

Wonderful.

Why do we – as adults – make so little of gratitude?

And find it so hard to verbalize it?

Or allow ourselves to get hung up….

On what others might think if we just said the words, “Your kindness means so much to me”?

Or on the timing of such a remark?

Or on the “appropriateness” of it?

Why do we let the moments that touch us – go?

Isn’t life lived in the tiny, every day moments?

Shouldn’t we be most grateful when they are undeniably beautiful?

“We pray for the big things and forget to give thanks for the ordinary, small (and yet really not small) gifts.”
– Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Life Together: The Classic Exploration of Christian Community

Why Ugly Decorations Are Good

Why Ugly Decorations Are Good

Two unofficial members of our household made their seasonal debuts at our home yesterday, so I thought I’d take a moment to introduce them to you on this, day four of my Month of Good News 2016.
This is Lucy, Guardian of the Front Porch.

lucy

She’s been with us for about a decade. I think I got her at Michael’s craft store for about $6, back when I was trying to make sure our oldest son gained an awareness of the changing seasons. He and this little scarecrow were about the same size, but she didn’t acquire a name until my daughter came along and dubbed her ‘Lucy.’ The name stuck, and now our youngest son has an oddly strong attachment to her.

And this is Cheese.

cheese

I don’t know who named him. But he is a remnant of my brother-in-law’s surprise Halloween-themed 40th birthday party, which was held in 2001. My husband insisted that we keep this lovely trinket as a souvenir. Once, I suggested we get rid of it – an idea for which I was nearly tarred and feathered.

Little did I know that Cheese would become our children’s all-time favorite Halloween decoration. It moves around the house throughout October as the kids desperately try to recreate the famous “Great Shriek” scene of a few years back, when Cheese was placed in my bed. I encountered it unwittingly and responded accordingly.

As you can see, I have a love/hate relationship with Lucy and Cheese. We have other knickknacks that are better looking, and they are displayed as well. But when the kids begin to feel festive in October, these are the two decorations they are most excited to see. From now until January 6, there will be many kinds of holiday embellishments in our home. Thus, Lucy and Cheese ring in the holiday season – Halloween, Thanksgiving, Christmas, and New Year.

Today I was looking for a quote about holidays and found this one from Philip Andrew Adams, an Australian humanist, social commentator, broadcaster, and filmmaker:

“To many people holidays are not voyages of discovery, but a ritual of reassurance.”

I don’t know Adams, so I can’t say whether we’d agree on other topics, but I do think holidays are a time of reassurance, especially for the young and young at heart.

The traditions we keep – like putting out certain decorations – remind our spirits that there is a continuity that cannot be shaken. This speaks Truth to our souls, in a time when we need solidity and comfort. 

For this, I am grateful. Because even if they are ugly, decorations show we have reason to celebrate and give thanks. Good news, for sure.

Holy Moments – Day 23 – Thanks for the Bounce

He was intent on taking his Spider-Man wallet to the mall. It wouldn’t even fit in the tiny back pocket of his jeans, so I assured him I’d keep his money safe in my purse. All $.75 of it.

What he thought he’d buy with those five nickels, three dimes and twenty pennies, I have no idea. But he wanted to find something.

My husband and oldest son were camping for the weekend, so I had taken my little guy and his older sister to the mall on Saturday to get some early Christmas shopping done. And wow – were we productive! We spent 2 1/2 hours moving from store to store, searching and finding – it was one of the best days shopping with kids I’ve ever had! The best part was, I didn’t hear a single complaint. Not a one. We were  in the Christmas spirit and the second to last week of November hadn’t even started. Miracles are everywhere….

Our last stop was in the Marbles Brain Store, where the kids were looking for a gift for their older brother. While trying out every gadget in the place, my sweet little guy emerged from a corner with one of those magical, classic toys. A blue rubber bouncy ball.

His eyes were aglow with delight.

“Mom – I want to buy this.”

“Well, it costs $1.99 and you only have $.75 in your wallet. That isn’t enough.”

image

His face fell, and it about broke my heart.

“I tell you what. I’ll buy it for you, and when we get home, you can pay me back from your piggy bank.”

“Really?!!”

He was SO surprised. This kind of thing had never been done before. Mom buying a toy – for me! – spontaneously?!? Unheard of.

“Yes.”

“OK!!!! Thanks, Mom!”

When we got home and I took the ball out of the bag for him, he ran off giggling. I had no intention of making him pay me back. At this point, he’s 5, and not earning the coins that are in his bank; they are just pieces he’s picked up here and there. We can discuss larger lessons about hard work and sacrifice when he’s older. For the moment, I was content to just to see him enjoy this gift.

But what surprised me, was what happened next. Hardly a minute had passed when he came running back into the room and threw his arms around my waist and squeezed. Just squeezed. A good, loooooong, hug-squeeze.

“Thank you SO much, Mommy,” he said.

Hearing those five words was absolutely the very best part of my day. And therein was my lesson.

If I want to warm the heart of The Giver, all I really need to do is to run to Him with arms outstretched and a deeply grateful heart. I couldn’t pay Him back for all the blessings He’s given me if I had all the riches in the world.

I wish you and yours a joy-filled and blessed Thanksgiving.

Day 29 – Write it on Your Heart

I got out the hearts today. The wooden hearts. We started writing on these at Thanksgiving a couple years ago, when I hoped it would become an annual tradition. Every person in our home for the holiday writes on one side of the heart what he or she is thankful for this year, and on the other, their name and the date. Over time, we’ll have a record of gratitude that can be arranged in a vase, or tossed in a bowl to be sifted through and remembered.

One of my very best friends gave me this ‘hearts’ idea, and I liked it because it’s similar to writing thank-notes or making gratitude lists.  And I like to write thank-you notes. Seriously. Some people find them tedious but I don’t. In fact, I’ve found that the old adage “you can’t hold a positive and negative thought in your head at the same time” is true, because when I’m feeling a bit down or having an “off” day, the best remedy for me is to write a thank-you note to someone, for any good reason I can think of.  And if I can’t think of anyone, I can always build on my gratitude list to God, starting right where I am.

I read (and re-read) an amazing book this year called One Thousand Gifts by Ann Voskamp.  In it, she takes counting blessings to a whole new level.  How?  First, she unravels the word eucharisteo, the original Greek word used in the Gospel of Luke to describe Jesus giving thanks at the Last Supper. Eucharisteo means thanksgiving, and within it is the Greek word charis, meaning grace, and its derivative chara, meaning joy.  So, there is a correlation between giving thanks to God for the gifts of His grace that we see all around us (even the tiniest things!), and experiencing joy. The miracle is that this works even when we think there is nothing to be thankful for.

This year has been a difficult one for my family.  We’ve lost several family members, and we miss them this Thanksgiving. But when we had to say goodbye to each of them, I began my daily prayers with litanies of thanks for all the things I could think of about each person, and it pulled my focus off my sadness, and onto them, where they are now, in God’s light.

image

 

Day 19 – Turn-down Service

Last night I was talking with my grandparents (now both 92) about a trip we all took together 30 years ago, when I was 11 and my sister was 8. We stayed in a hotel where I experienced for the very first time a little luxury I haven’t seen recently – turn-down service. Here’s how I remember it:

It was late in the evening and my eyes were heavy. My grandparents, my sister and I were all dressed up, having just attended a banquet dinner – the final event of a boating race weekend that my grandfather had been participating in. We had gotten ready in the room before dinner and left in a hurry. (Now that I have children, I know how the adults present must have felt at the time.  Trying to rush along two young girls who are busy styling their hair and admiring themselves in the mirror is no small feat….but I digress.). The dinner had been lovely – multiple courses, an ice sculpture of a prop in the middle of the ballroom, dancing afterwards. My sister and I felt like celebrities as the only kids there, and though we all had a great time, we were ready to get back and into bed.

To my young eyes, the room was like a dream. Lights dimmed just so. Toiletries neatly organized by the sink. Clothes hung or laid carefully across the suitcases. Bedspreads folded and set aside. Blankets tucked in perfectly at the ends of the beds. Crisp white sheets folded down from the center of each bed into neat triangles. And perched atop each perfectly fluffed and sleep-ready pillow was a foil-wrapped chocolate mint. Trying not to muss anything, I sat on the edge of the bed and let that decadent little piece of chocolate melt on my tongue. It was glorious!

The best part of the ‘turn-down’ experience for me was the chocolate mint. I recognized in that one little thing, a singular moment of unexpected joy.  For someone else, the experience might have been different, or lacked sparkle altogether. But for me, it was a gift – a sweet lightness.

Is it possible, as an adult, to find the same kind of joy?  I think so, but I also think it requires a kind of practice….Practice at keeping my clouded eyes open to see where the gifts are, so I can recognize them as such and then savor them like I savored that mint.

Sunlight was streaming into our room today as my alarm went off.  For weeks it’s been dark, but with daylight savings time, morning feels like morning again. I hit the snooze and lay silently studying the yellow rays peeking around the sides of the curtains, wanting to burst into our room. In the quiet, I could savor the miracle of that sweet light and feel joy rising again, as I gave thanks for the gift that it is.