This Is My Beloved and This Is My Friend

I spent the day yesterday pouring over picture from our first three years, trying to find all of our honeymoon pictures that had been inadvertently mixed in. How I wish I had had the camera I have now! There was only one picture of us together in Williamsburg. I didn't realize it until we got our pictures back. Since then, I have stopped complete strangers on a regular basis to have them take our picture together on every little day trip or vacation!


But do you know what I thought as I looked at all of these pictures together? "What a good life." Old friends remember with us the bumps along the way, but on vacations people would still ask if we were on our honeymoon three years later.


Before we were married, I thought we were special. That we had something magical, a deeper bond than other couples had. Intense passion, idolatry... he was my life.


Then came life, clarity, shattered illusions, pregnancies, hormones, and the magic was illusive. I couldn't hold onto it, sometimes I couldn't feel it at all. But I went searching. Not for love, but for truth. Choosing to love. Choosing to see my faults and acknowledge my need for God in every part of my life.


Ten years later, I've come full circle. I love being his wife. I still believe in love at first sight. And I love those moments when it's just the two of us again and I see that we are better and stronger than we were. Together we stand heart to heart with God. The threefold cord in the verses we requested for our wedding ceremony. No idolatry, no illusions.

And we still have that extraordinary connection. I have a deep respect for who he is and who I can be with him.


Two that have become one. The passion runs deeper now, and the magic sparkles in ordinary moments.