I got the chance to talk to a friend today. We started to talk about marriage. I told him that after being married for over twenty years, I found that I even loved the things I hated about my husband.
The little paper rolls that are left over once all the toilet paper is gone have become part of my marriage. My husband is great about changing the toilet paper, but he often gets distracted and forgets to throw away that paper roll. I find them all over the place. It is funny and frustrating all at the same time. Yet, I know that after twenty years, if I didn’t have that, I would miss it.
There are all kinds of little things like that about my husband that make me think about the Bible passage that says love is patient and kind. It goes both ways, too. I know there are ways I drive him crazy, too.
I think that marriage has helped me to understand what the whole embrace life idea means. In my own life, there’s going to be wonderful things that are easy to love and then there are going to be really difficult things, but I don’t get to pick and choose different events in my life. It would be like saying that I wanted to pick and chose different aspects of my husband to love. I can’t. I choose to love all of him. When I embrace life as a beautiful gift from God, I chose love all of it, even the difficult, painful parts. It’s strange the older I get, I realize that even the worse times in my life have the potential to be blessings in disguise. I just have to let those miracles happen and have an open heart.
My faith saved me. May God’s peace reside in all of our lives.
