Finer Niner

This is not a typical anniversary post, but a truthful one. John and I were poor candidates to get married. Not for the reasons you might expect: race, culture, religion--these are all factors we have had to grapple with and sometimes reconcile. But the problem is that when you get together at 19, 21 respectively, your brains are not yet fully formed. When you get married at 24, 26 respectively, you might think that marriage is all about *you.* At least that was the case for me. I honestly perceived marriage as "you do your thing over there, I'll do mine over here, and we'll come together and talk about it over an overpriced dinner in a hipster neighborhood." I have learned that marriage is actually about sharing everything, offering a window on your soul to another, sorting through the garbage and the fecal matter to find the prized jewel of commonality, of mutual respect. In this marriage, I have encountered the most profound grace, the love not earned but given undeservedly. My mister and I have experienced soaring highs over the birth of our children and the community of friends and family who have supported us. We have also experienced the deepest valleys: depression, financial hardship, family pain. Through it all, and I know you were all waiting for this one, God has been so faithful, reminding us so kindly that marriage is preparing us for Heaven, where joy is multiplied, where selfish needs are set aside, where our focus is fixed on the stuff eternal.

There are moments in this marriage that could not be auto-tinted with Instagram filters to showcase the glamour and shadow the pain. This marriage has been made of raw moments, brilliant and unapologetic in living color. This marriage is not a clever hashtag, summarized in a retweetable aphorism or a Live, Laugh, Love print bought at Homegoods. In the conventions of Facebook, yes I sure did marry my best friend 9 years ago this week. And I would do it again, knowing all that I know now, and all that I do not yet know. I look forward to getting together with my sweet mister to talk about it all, even if the dinner is cheap, even if the restaurant is not trendy. We'll order different things, but ultimately it doesn't matter because I'll always have what he's having: all the joy, all the pain, and a happy ending sundae for dessert.

4 pairs of Converse high-tops

We bought four pairs. You came into the world with four pairs of Converse hightop shoes. Daddy bought unisex colors: two sets of aqua (unisex? debatable) and two sets of black, because we didn't know if you were a boy or girl. But we were prepared with hightops, sizes 3, 5, 7, 9.

We didn't know how this would work, you joining us, no other family member for 1000 miles, Mama in grad school, Daddy working 3 jobs. When the nurses handed you to me, I couldn't tell if it was just the anesthesia making me shiver or if the great and profound weight of this new life in my care was making me quake. I was holding 8 lb. 1 oz. of beautiful you but the pull of gravity at that moment was much greater. Like a Mac truck had backed into my hospital bed and dropped a heap-ton of work and sleeplessness into my lap. Somehow--and I can't explain it because I think you have to experience it firsthand--a feeling washed over me that you were the only one thing in my life that I couldn't get out of, and yet we were going to be ok, you and I and Daddy, and that we were going to be so, so happy together.

I mean, for starters, at least we had shoes.

The first time I saw your Daddy walking up the hill of Schultz lawn, he was wearing Converse. They were red Chucks, the only appropriate choice for the man who captured my young heart.

Whenever we would go to visit your grandparents in Ann Arbor, we would visit Sam's to buy ourselves a new pair of Cons.

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It's terribly naive to think that we should make this bulk investment in Converse for a girl who would not walk for another 13 months, but I suppose the shoes symbolize our naivete and our induction of you into our Converse club.

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You put the last pair on today, the bookends on this shoe collection, and you complained that they were pinching your toes. It felt unfair, that you had outgrown these shoes that had once seemed so impossibly big without our even noticing it.

This, too, is a symbol of the invisible ache that your own growth causes the people who love you most in this world, and also of the wonderful shoes you have yet to fill that you do not yet own, in sizes we cannot yet fathom.

Virgin Campout

We took our maiden voyage as a family into the great wilderness of the Chilhowee campground with our churchies. Times in a tent were had. Most of them were exhausting. Loverpants spent most of the time feeling under the weather and packing and cooking food over a Charlie Brown -esque stovetop. I spent most of the time telling Little Man to stop showing the other campground inhabitants the full moon before dark (oy). Baby Girl spent most of the time having an absolute ball, and her infectious sense of adventure and frivolity made it all feel so worth the effort. I don't know why it took us six years to camp as a family, but I'm so glad we finally did. Seeing my kids in a whole new environment, outside the comforts of PBSKids on Demand, a pantry full of snacks, and fluffy beds was revealing. I learned a lot. Like how my children have evolved to not need me so much. They can explore and return; they can make new friends and come back to me for snuggles. The helicopter propellers will still spin phdumb phdumb phdumb but the aircraft doesn't have to hover so close. It felt good to be able to sit and read a book. It felt better to still look around and see my favorite 3 people all under one nylon canopy, asleep against the din of a whippoorwill during mating season. I am so tired from the weekend and I can't wait until the next time we get to sleep under the stars. I'm pretty sure we can count on a full moon either way.

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On the way to the campground, Baby Girl went reeling out to the car with a huge backpack.

Loverpants: What's in there? Baby Girl: You'll find out! Loverpants: I don't want to find out!

We later found out. No one else had packed pillows but the stuffed pig had his own. No Girl Scout badges were earned for that one.