Fall in Love

Tomorrow is the day I thought I would get married.  You see four years ago, on a sunny autumn afternoon much like the ones we have been experiencing lately, Adam and I laid eyes on each other's Catholic Match profiles for the first time. It was lunchtime for me down in North Carolina and he was just getting started with his work day out on the West Coast. By the end of the day, multiple messages had been exchanged and a couple of nights later, we found ourselves face to face via Skype as we began the first of many long from the heart conversations.

As our relationship grew and love began to fill in all the spaces, I remember taking note of that fateful October 21st date. At one point, as we discerned marriage and family plans, I flipped through my phone calendar to see when 10/21 would next fall on a Saturday as a potential wedding date. "Oh my, 2017...I don't know if I can wait that long!" I thought to myself before shrugging it off seeing as we weren't even engaged yet.

Fast forward to the summer that followed that beautiful fall of falling in love with Adam and we were much to my complete surprise engaged!! I had always dreamt of a fall wedding but with having plans to move and start a new job that fall, needing to complete our pre-Cana wedding prep, and our living on opposite ends of the country at the time, it didn't seem prudent to marry within a few months of being engaged yet we didn't want to have a 1.5 year engagement.

So we opted for an early summer wedding in late May. It was a beautiful day and a blessed beginning to our new vocation even if it looked completely different from my dreams of how I had envisioned my wedding to be. However, the truth is - - - it isn't about me. Or the weather or the backdrop of changing colors atop the trees. It is about following God's timing and letting go of how you thought it would all go. If we had done it my way, we would not have had the last 2.5 years of being husband and wife and would not be enjoying our rambunctious toddler of a daughter right now.

Yeah, God knew what He was doing when He threw us together four years ago and led us to be married within 1.5 years.

Marriage is hard. It is humbling. It is redemptive and allows you to forgive and be forgiven. Four short years ago, I was full of hope and optimism for what could be. Now, on the other side, amidst pain and brokenness, I find myself feeling so thankful for my husband all over again for his humor, care, and strength as I work to put myself back together again. Marriage requires sacrifice and patience but is altogether beautiful and committing to make the choice to love each and every day.

May 23rd is our wedding anniversary but I still get my fall "anniversary" with my honey because we celebrate our meeting date each October 21st! This year, we will have to delay that celebration by a day though because one of my best friends from right after college is actually getting married in Pennsylvania tomorrow (!!!) and Adam had to  stay behind in Ohio to do schoolwork. How fun for my mom and me though to be at a wedding on 10/21/17 after all!!

Yes, October 21, 2013 will forever hold a special place in my heart. I can't believe all that has happened over the last four years and pray I can get back to the happy, hopeful, optimistic girl Adam fell in love with in 2013.

I close now with a prayer I stumbled upon from Fr. Arrupe, a Jesuit priest, called "Fall in Love" -

Nothing is more practical than
finding God, than
falling in Love
in a quite absolute, final way.
What you are in love with,
what seizes your imagination, will affect everything.
It will decide
what will get you out of bed in the morning,
what you do with your evenings,
how you spend your weekends,
what you read, whom you know,
what breaks your heart,
and what amazes you with joy and gratitude.
Fall in Love, stay in love,
and it will decide everything.

From Finding God in All Things: A Marquette Prayer Book © 2009 Marquette University Press. Used with permission.