Ponderings...

One of my closest, dearest friends is divorced.  I was maid of honor in her wedding in 1999.  I remember when she and her now-ex-husband were just starting to date.  He was the youth pastor and she was a senior in high school when she started liking him.  But it was super frowned upon so nothing happened until after she graduated.  They told each other how they felt over IM.  HA!  I happened to be spending the night at her house on that fateful night so she woke me up at 2am to tell me "he feels the same way".  I remember having no blessed clue what she was talking about until she said she was still IM-ing her guy.  And so they dated and eventually got married.  Then got divorced.  

It occurred to me recently that marriage is such a gamble.  You are trusting this other person with your life, not to mention your heart.  At the beginning of every relationship, there are all these feelings.  Love, lust, attraction, admiration...the list goes on.  Then reality starts to set in.  What used to be cute and endearing is now annoying as hell.  Working late used to show dedication to a job.  Now it's just a way to avoid going home.  You add kids to the mix and all sorts of new problems show up.  

So what makes a marriage last?  

I used to think that I had the best marriage in the world.  Most days I still think that.  But there are days...days I think there's no way in the world I can live with this man for one more second.  Days I think I'd be better off alone.  I'm not a perfect person.  I will never claim to be one.  I don't know of any perfect people in this world.  So for 2 imperfect people to come together and live in harmony?  Hard to believe.  There are going to be conflicts.  There are going to be days when one or both of you want to throw in the towel.  There will even be days when one or both of you throw down the gauntlet and say "enough!!"  I've had those days.  It wasn't long ago that my husband and I were considering divorce.  Neither of us were happy.  We had slipped into complacency and accepted that things would never change.  Finally one day, I said I was done.  I couldn't live like that anymore.  I cried, I yelled, I cried some more.  How could my life have taken such a drastic turn?  On our wedding day I loved my husband with such a fierceness I never thought we'd grow apart.  But that's exactly what happened.  There was no abuse, there was no affair, just simply...stoic indifference.  I looked at this man who I had loved with every fiber of my being and I saw a stranger.  He looked at me and saw the same.  We had become two completely different people living two separate lives.  So what to do?  The easy answer would be to throw in the towel.  For some, that's the only answer.   

We weren't ready to make that break.  For all our faults, we knew that love was the basis of our relationship.  We had to work...we had to work hard to make it back from the brink.  But we did.  Our marriage is stronger now than they day we were married.  There are still hard days.  We fight, we get angry.  But we don't allow ourselves to become indifferent.  

I wish in our pre-marital counseling, our pastor would have said "you will want to end this marriage at some point".  Of course no engaged couple wants to hear that!  Still, it'd be nice to hear that we're normal.  But we fought for us.  We made a commitment and we stuck to it.  

I don't know why this was on my mind today.  It just was.  Maybe I need to cut back on the sugar...  

My Second 5K Experience

I have now completed my 2nd 5K.  Was is everything I had ever hoped for?  That and more.  Why, you ask?  Well, let me just give you a run-down of the events.  
Weeks ago, I saw an advertisement at the YMCA for a 5K at Grandview College.  It was on a weekend I was actually in town and it was cheap.  But the best part is that I would get a t-shirt.  I'm all about the free t-shirts.  
So I signed up and coerced a co-worker to go with me.  It was going to be her first 5K and she was convinced she'd be walking by the end of the first block.  Hey, I thought, it'd make me feel better about my slogging (slow+jogging=slogging).  The morning of the race was pretty cloudy and looked like it could rain.  I had said the night before that if it was raining, I wasn't running.  I'm a fair weather runner.  I hate that damp feeling when you're a bit wet but not quite drenched.  Yuck!  So, the weather people said it wasn't going to rain until the afternoon so I figured I was good.  I met my co-worker, Sherry at the starting line and we waited for the start.  As we looked around at all the other runners, we realized that most were college students.  Yep, we were the old ones.  Granted, it was Homecoming weekend at Grandview so there were a few random white-hairs but for the most part, it was young people in their spandex.  Lovely.  The gun went off and off we went.  


The first mile went well.  We were running through residential streets which was somewhat pretty except that that part of town is a little ghetto.  I will remind you that Sherry was sure she'd be too tired to run past the first block.  Uhh...no.  She was slogging right along with me, sometimes getting ahead of me!  Little twerp.  By mile 2, we were starting to get some raindrops.  A minutes later the skies opened up and it was a downpour.  Great.  Now I could get that miserable damp feeling as I slog along.  Somehow I was able to finish the race.  I was done in 37 minutes, which surprised me!  That's 4 minutes faster than my first 5K.  Very nice.  
OH...speaking of that free t-shirt, here's a funny story.  I picked up the shirt and race packet over my lunch break on Friday.  When I got back to work and looked at the shirt, I was appalled to see it was a bright red long-sleeve shirt with a giant Viking on the front.  Really?  Who designs these things?  So as I was looking at it, I made a comment to a few co-workers that it could double as a Superman cape if I put it behind me.  I proceeded to do just that and started to flutter down the hallway.  As I turned the corner, I ran smack into the radiologist.  Yep, I'm the epitome of gracefulness.  My face turned the same shade as the red shirt and he looked away really quickly as he was trying not to laugh.  The rest of the afternoon, every time I had to go talk to him, he'd start laughing and I would turn red.  *sigh*   At least I don't work with him for a few more weeks.  Maybe he'll forget about it.  

Things I never thought I'd say...

Being a mother is an adventure, to say the least!  Over the years, I've heard things come out of my mouth that I SWORE I'd never say.  Or things I never thought I'd say in my adult life.  Here are a few samplings...

~"Did you wipe?", quickly followed by "did you flush?"
~"Don't put that in your mouth/ear/nose/any orifice"
~"Did you just push your brother off the bed?"
~"Don't touch your poop"
~"Spread your legs so I can wash your bottom"
~"Hannah, that's Noah's boy bottom.  Leave it alone"
~"That is the difference between boys and girls.  Let's just leave it at that."
~"Flies can't hurt you."
~"You're a lion, huh?  Well, bring your lion self on over to the table"
~"Don't eat the Desitin!"
~"No you can't play with a real sword.  They're very dangerous"
~"When your father gets home, you can explain to him why you did ___________"
~"Honey, George is a pretend monkey.  He can't actually do these things"

There are so many more that I can't think of right now.  Life became much more interesting when we brought Noah into the family.  Hannah and Noah love playing with each other but it does make for some stressful days.  I wouldn't change them for anything though.

Day at the Lake

Joel's boss owns some land on a lake in southern Iowa.  Her house hasn't been built yet so she literally owns land only.  But it buts right up to the lake so she had a beach put in.  Yes, you read that correctly.  She put in a beach.  Funny.  So this past Saturday, she invited all her employees (there's only a dozen or so) so her land for the day.  She also has a boat and a 2-person tube to pull behind.  It's about a 2 hour drive to get there so I knew Noah wouldn't do well with the distance (that boy HATES to be strapped in his car seat for more than a few minutes!) so we left him at home for the day and just planned on taking Hannah.  It ended up working out that Salli and her kids came down for the weekend too.  So we brought Natalie and Jack along with us and left Salli at home with Noah and Katie.

It was an awesome day to be at the lake!  It was warm and sunny so the water felt great.  Jack had a great time rolling around in the sand.  Literally...rolling...in...the...sand.  His scalp was plastered with sand by the end of the day!  After a while, we all went out on the boat.  Natalie was the first to ride on the tube. She had such a great time.  She had the biggest smile on her face.  Poor Joel had to lay down practically on top of her and hold on tight to make sure she didn't go flying off.  They both had life jackets on but still...

Joel took a little breather to rest his biceps while another few kids had a turn then Hannah wanted to go.  She got on the tube...and that was about it.  It's one thing to watch, another to actually do.  But she got to sit on it so fine.

Jack wanted to go too.  He did pretty well.  He had a huge grin on his face for the first few minutes.  After that, it was time to be done.

By the time we got home that night, all of us were sunburned, filthy, and exhausted but had a great time.  Hopefully next year we can get Hannah on the tube and actually pull her around.