B and I were afforded the opportunity to spend an entire 6 days in San Diego earlier this month. It was amazing. Not only were we kid-free, we were on the West Coast, and were able to spend a lot of time with some dear old friends. One night we had dinner with some sweet friends from TBS who are now stationed out there. Having been married for a little over a year, they decided to ask us "old marrieds" for advice. This sounds awful, but nothing came to my mind immediately. The past year has just been such a roller coaster for me in all aspects of life and I've spent a good bit of it feeling like a complete failure at everything, I felt like the last person anyone should ask advice from. But then it hit me and I told them that the most important thing I think I've learned about marriage in the past seven years is that love is a choice. The ooey-gooey, touchy-feely, lovey-doveys fade fast and you must wake up everyday to the same person and remember that you made a choice to love them and choose to love them again that day.
Love is found in the day to day. The making of meals and beds, the cleaning up of kitchens, bathrooms, tables, etc, etc. I am finding that this is true of parenting as well. I've been pretty open about my struggles during the first bit of Miller's life and I find that the longer I simply take care of him, the more and more I love him. With every diaper change, every bottle shake, every time I rock him, every chorus of "Sweet Afton" that I sing, my heart is drawn closer to this little man who I at one time thought had made me crazy. Even now, as I listen to him "cry it out" for naptime, I love that him. (The same is true for Els too, I am just using Miller as the illustration.)
We are called as mothers to lay our lives down for our families everyday. And then get up the next morning and do it again on whatever sleep we were allotted.
D.C. Talk had it right. Love is a verb.
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