This is Us

A typical day for us goes a little something like this.......

Anthony gets up first and reads his Bible and drinks a ridiculous amount of coffee. It's one cup. It's a rather large cup, but it's one cup. My alarm goes off right before he gets into the shower and I drag myself out of the bed. (I would like to add here that I recently have been getting up and doing my personal quiet time while he is in another room doing his. I have been horrible about this as I have become less of a morning person since the homeschool adventure with all the kids started.) We get dressed and right before I wake up the kids, I get a quick "I love you!," a kiss,  and he's out the door headed to work. We see each other (usually) at lunch time. We have an hour to catch up on the day so far and for me to unload to him about how rough my part of the day has been. Once again, he's out the door. He comes home about 5:30pm and he hits the kitchen while I work. We sit and eat. We typically do some kind of needed chore or run around with the kids for a bit and then hit the sack. Wasn't that the perfect day you dreamed about when you thought about getting married?

This is us, day in and day out. Some days we throw in a baseball or basketball game, church, time with extended family, or my not so favorite trip--Wal-mart. But for the most part, this is us.

When you are considering marriage as young adults, it seems so romantic and blissful. We were married straight out of college (literally in between semesters of our graduate program). I remember all the high hopes and great expectations I had walking into the whole situation. They all came crashing into reality the day we were married. I am not lying when I say I basically had a panic attack leaving the church on our way to our honeymoon. Everything hit me like a brick wall as I sat in the car next to this man I had just married, and the tears just came. I had left everything I had ever known behind at the church--everyone having a fantastic time, enjoying life, and eating my cake. Of course, Anthony was totally taken aback as I lost it for about 30 minutes or so. He may have been nervous that day, but he wasn't at all thinking about the past. He seemed totally ready for the future. That was us.

As time went on, I realized just how hard married life really is. I worked incredibly crazy hours at a job that was over 30 minutes away from him. Work was a big deal for both of us and we wanted to be the best we could. It's amazing how much that took a toll on our marriage. I look back now and I am ashamed that I put our relationship on the back burner during that crucial time. The first five years of marriage are insane. I don't think anyone ever really said that to us out loud. I think people hinted at it, but never said it straight out. I am saying it loud and clear. THE FIRST FIVE YEARS ARE CRAZY HARD. If you are reading this and you are in those years, definitely take time to get to know your spouse. Invest in your relationship because so many things come along after those first five years that you will never find the time to do it later. In those first years you learn so much about each other. Not just likes and dislikes, but hopes, dreams, preferences, secrets, etc. Looking back, I feel like I knew more about the lives of my students than I did about Anthony's. It wasn't because I cared for him less, I just gave most of my time and effort to my students. That was us.

To be completely honest, we hit a very tough time in our marriage about year 4. There were moments where I questioned what in the world I was doing! What had I gotten myself into? If you think about it, most people don't even date very long, so when you get a few years in, it's really like, "Uh-oh! I am really deep into this thing and there is no going back!" But you learn that love is a choice. I also realized that if I wanted to keep my marriage on the right track, I had to fight like crazy for it. There are constant attacks to try and destroy what you have built.

Later, kids come into the picture. It's a totally new ball game. That's when you realize you should have been investing more time in your marriage back in the day, before they came along! (There are days that I can't figure out what we did before we had kids! We must have been extremely lazy.) Time together alone lessens with each new addition. You wonder when you will ever sleep together again, much less get to "cuddle." Communicating with each other often consists of words that you would never have said to each other before. For instance, our conversations now include words like "pooped on my back" and "trucks in my hair." Romantic dinners consist of four men at the dining room table dressed in suits with big smiles. Don't get me wrong, it's an amazing family life, but our couple time is limited. This is us.

Tomorrow (May 10th) will mark our 14th anniversary. Saying that out loud blows my mind. We have been on this journey for 14 years (well longer if you count how long we dated). Have I loved him every single day? No. Has he lived up to every single expectation? No. Has he ever made me so mad I wanted to pack up and go home? Yes. Have I ever wanted to give up? Yes. I think anyone who answers those questions differently at any stage of marriage is lying. We are human and love is a choice. We don't always make the right choices. I wish I could answer those questions differently, but I am human, and heaven help me, I am a woman.

As we celebrate 14 years, I wanted to share a few things that Anthony does to make us who we are. He is a godly man who makes mistakes and owns up to them. He tells me what I need to hear, even when I don't want to hear it (or I think he's wrong). He supports me even when I feel like a complete failure. He loves his children and he leads by example. He works hard at his job even when the reward may not be what he deserves. He loves people and has a heart the size of Texas. All of these things and more are what he does to make us the couple that you see in front of you every day. Yeah we may be frazzled, late, and have one child that is only wearing one shoe, or might be pulling his pants down in public, but we are together, happy, and working hard to be what God wants us to be. This is us, and I couldn't be more grateful.

Busy, Busy, Busy......Taking time to breathe....

I know you devoted followers out there have been wondering why in the world I have not been posting lately! Well, that's a good question. I have a good answer--I have been busy! As if being a mother of two fiesty little boys wasn't enough, I have added teacher, photographer, part-time worker, maid, and much more back on to the list recently. Don't get me wrong! I am not complaining in the least. I am just explaining my absence.

I decided in the quiet moments of this late evening to take the time to encourage all you people out in the virtual world to take some time to breathe. I have not done that in the last few weeks. I have rushed, rushed, rushed through every activity, phone call, work activity, Bible study, etc. To make it worse, I feel like I even rushed through our annual camping trip last weekend! I am going to do my best to chill out the next few days and focus on the must do's (feeding my kids, our animals, and dealing with the necessities of life) and do a few of the I want to do's. I am going to blog some, read some, run some and more. I don't care what it takes....I am not going to rush the next few days. I encourage you to do the same!

Before you know it...you'll be rushing to your grave....and Lord knows I don't want to do that!

Great Expectations

I have been reading the book of Mark before I go to bed each night. Last night, I read the following:

"And they come unto him, bringing one sick of the palsy, which was borne of four.

⁴And when they could not come nigh unto him for the press, they uncovered the roof where he was: and when they had broken it up, they let down the bed wherein the sick of the palsy lay.

⁵When Jesus saw their faith, he said unto the sick of the palsy, Son, thy sins be forgiven thee.

⁶But there was certain of the scribes sitting there, and reasoning in their hearts,

⁷Why doth this man thus speak blasphemies? who can forgive sins but God only?

⁸And immediately when Jesus perceived in his spirit that they so reasoned within themselves, he said unto them, Why reason ye these things in your hearts?

⁹Whether is it easier to say to the sick of the palsy, Thy sins be forgiven thee; or to say, Arise, and take up thy bed, and walk?

¹⁰But that ye may know that the Son of man hath power on earth to forgive sins, (he saith to the sick of the palsy,)

¹¹I say unto thee, Arise, and take up thy bed, and go thy way into thine house.

¹²And immediately he arose, took up the bed, and went forth before them all; insomuch that they were all amazed, and glorified God, saying, We never saw it on this fashion."

As I read the passage, the order of events struck me as odd. Here is a man who desperately needs to be physically HEALED. His friends go through all this effort to drop him through the roof to be HEALED by Jesus. The most obvious thing that needs to be done is the HEALING of this man's body. (Did I drive home my point enough?) What happens when he finally is set before Jesus? Jesus sees faith and forgives the man's sin.

Maybe you are on a holier plain than I, but my first thought was, "Forgiving his sins? What about the poor guy's body?" Forgiveness was not what I expected. I have heard the story hundreds of times, but I never realized the order of the events--or the significance. I had to put myself in the place of this man. Here I am, finally getting my chance after years of suffering to be healed. There is all this build up as my friends rip up the roof to lower me through. I am laying at the feet of Jesus and He says, "Son, thy sins be forgiven thee." I don't know if that is what the man expected, but it wouldn't be what I expected. I would have expected Him to tell me to get up and run a few laps around the synagogue. I wish I knew what was going through that guy's mind when Jesus forgave him of his sins first. Was that what he expected??

As I read on into the chapter, I realized that in a way, I was having an attitude like that of the scribes. I wasn't questioning Jesus' ability to forgive sins, but I was questioning his judgment. Who was I to decide what needed to happen first? Who were these scribes to question Him? Who was I to say the order of how the Son of God does things?

As I thought more about it, the order of events made more sense. What was more important--the forgiveness of this man's sins or the healing of his body? Obviously, the forgiveness of his sins should have been the first thing on his mind when coming before the Son of God. Hopefully, this man was nothing like me--I would have expected to be healed. Yet, God did something much greater for this man than healing his physical body.

I wrote all this to say this--how often do we expect God to work in a certain way and it doesn't turn out how we think it should? I know I am so guilty of thinking I know how things should work out. Admit it! We all have these grand ideas and then we realize that our Heavenly Father has something even greater for us, beyond what we have expected. For instance, the man in the book of Mark probably never expected to be healed. He probably never expected to have the Son of God ever come near enough to him to be healed. When he saw the crowd he probably never expected to get close enough to have a chance encounter. The list could go on and on.

Recently, my expectations have not been great by any means. In fact, I would say I have been expecting the worst. The truth is, we should expect great things. We have a mighty God who thought enough of us to die for us. Does this mean that everything will be great and perfect? No. Does that mean that God's plan always include only hilltops and no valleys? No way. Should we always expect our will to be the best way? You have got to be kidding! What we do have is hope. We should also expect our God to do great things. You will find that He exceeds even our greatest hopes.