Today is my four year wedding anniversary. In honor of today, and marriage in general, this was a journey I did not realize I'd be privileged to take. It is a journey with a beginning but really no end. How do you know you've done all you could in the vocation of marriage?
In my 20's I never wanted marriage let alone a boyfriend. Too much trouble! Somewhere in my 30's there was a tug in my heart of hearts. It was God suggesting otherwise. The "want" started small but made itself known pretty quickly.
I remember lamenting, or whining, to my spiritual director that I wanted a boyfriend, to get married, have babies (yep, that was a new one for someone that didn't like babies). He said that marriage might not be my vocation in life that consecrated single hood could be. Just because I "wanted" it didn't mean that was the path God chose for me long ago.
I wasn't exactly thrilled with that prospect. I wasn't dating yet. I was praying and doing Holy hours trying to figure things out. I was taking advice from my spiritual director to accept that I may be meant for single life. I kept asking, "how do I accept the single life"? He said, "you just do it, like Nike". I would come out of those meetings frustrated.
One day I must have "just done it". Guys came crawling out the woodwork - ok not really but for me dating 3 in a row was quite a streak! These failures and I mean failures showed me exactly what I did not need in a future husband!
During all this, I was praying to the Patron Saint of my Parish - St. Therese, the Little Flower. She is an awesome Saint. I prayed for a very LONG time for a sign if I should be married, if I'd find the right man...etc. She had been known to give little signs to people. I was hoping she would guide me.
Guide me she did! I met a man who lived 323 miles from my door to his! How we met isn't important. What is important is that he didn't fit this idealized list of superficial "characteristics" I thought my husband should have! For example, he did not have a four year college degree rather a two year voc tech degree. He had been married but had a annulment. He came with a teenage boy - A TEENAGE BOY!
What my future husband did have was spirituality. One that I consider deeper and more profound than my own. This was definitely a man that could help me get to heaven...but could I help him? He is one of kindest men I have known. Definitely one of the most humble and unassuming. He is a MAN in every sense of the word and my fiercest protector.
How did I know he was the one?
Remember, I had been praying for a long time to St. Therese to show me the way. Boy, did she ever! On our first date I picked up my future husband at a motel. I'll never forget that moment. He was leaning up against his pick up. Denim shorts with an orangish plaid summer shirt. He had tennis shoes on and the sun shone on his dirty blond hair. He was what some would say was a "tall drink of water" at 6'4". When I stopped, he reached in his truck and pulled out a dozen long stemmed deep red roses in a vase. I knew right then and there he was "the one". St. Therese had answered my prayer with her classic sign of a rose - a dozen to be exact. No man had ever given me roses before let alone on our first official date.
To sum up...we met, 9 months later we were married, 9 months later we conceived our little one, nine months later we had our little miracle. It has been four years, six moves, one new baby, one confirmation, one operation, 4 visits to the emergency room for one kid, 5 visits for the other, many hotel room anniversaries where I ruined the evening getting sick and I mean sick!
I love my husband more and deeper than the day we wed. He has brought joy in my life. He gives me a confidence I didn't know I had. He gave me my little girl and my big boy who graduates from high school in a few months. He gave me himself!
Here is to marriage, to my husband, and hopefully a sick free anniversary celebration tomorrow night!
The journey is still twisting and turning...I don't know where we'll end up only God knows. I can't wait to find out!
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