Thirty

I don't remember waking up on my wedding day. I don't remember thinking, "this is the last morning I'll wake up as a single lady." I vaguely remember going to church that morning - he was going to sit on the far right side of the assembly with his family, and I would be sitting on the far left side with mine. You know, so we wouldn't see each other before I walked down the aisle. Who knows who decided that was bad luck?!? But we held to that tradition, so the anticipation of the 4:00 ceremony filled the whole day.

 I remember not wanting to be fussed over. I did my own hair - which means I washed it, shook out my perm, and might have used a curling iron on a few strands in the front around my face. I did my own make up - which means I used a little mascara and some blush...and probably a little lipstick. My dress was made of antique lace - it had been something else before it was my dress, but I can't remember what. And I wore a hat, not a veil. That makes me smile, even now, thinking about it...I loved that hat!

Yes, thirty years ago today, two twenty-three year olds promised each other forever.

As I woke up this morning, and began to think back to my wedding day, I'm struck by the thought that I clearly knew how I wanted to get married. I had a very clear vision of a simple ceremony. Of the real, fairly un-adorned me, walking down the aisle. I knew that day wasn't for our parents or for our friends...it was for us. Our day. And as I look back now, all these many years later, I wouldn't change a thing.

As I sit here trying to put these thoughts together, I'm also painfully aware that knowing how to get married and learning how to be married, are two very different things. I'm very grateful the learning has stretched out over thirty years, because we are surely better at being married now than we ever have been. Though I seemed to understand how to bring my honest self to the aisle on that special day, it's taken me much longer to understand how to bring my honest self to our marriage each and every day for thirty years.

"Take your make-up off

Let your hair down

Take a breath

Look into the mirror at yourself

Don't you like you?

Cause I like you."

Colbie Caillat

Learning to like myself. To love myself, really...and believe that I am wholly and genuinely loved for who I am. Well, that has taken some time. But as we've journeyed together these thirty years, I've been given that gift. That gift of love and family and acceptance and home. And in this safe place that is our marriage, I have learned to love and to let myself be loved in ways that twenty-three year old me couldn't even have imagined! 

Happy Anniversary to my Oregon boy!

I love you now more than ever

and

my wish is for many, many more years with you!

Joining Kathy for Song-ography