Why we say "til death do us part"

It occurred to me that over the past couple of weeks - well months actually - it had been getting harder and harder to be married. Since I seem to be hell bent on being "coordinator of the universe" I am sure that I have been no picnic to live with. Add in daughter of to college, Dad off to Mayo Clinic, Mom having to shoulder much of the load alone, worries about the boys and ... well you get the picture.

While I was thinking about this, it came to me. There is a reason that we make a promise for forever: because otherwise when the newness wore off we would be running for the next new love- or running for the hills! Being married is hard, even when you are a good match for each other. It is expected that even in a marriage of mutual respect, there will be days that you want to bop your spouse over the head and clear up their thinking - and it takes awhile before you realize it is okay to feel that way. You cannot always control how you feel, but you can control what you do about it. It is hard to say the things that need to be said - to provide constructive criticism for each other when all you really want to do is lash out.

Oddly enough, I was reminded that there is a list for what love looks like in action: patient, kind, never jealous, never boastful - rejoicing in the truth. Being committed to each other is committing to a life of service - because there are no guarantees of jobs or health or money or time. We just have to the best we can with what we have. Rather than focusing on what we wanted - it seems much more healthy to focus on what we have before us. I just needed to write this for myself - as a reminder that I am blessed to have found someone who loves me and my kids enough to tolerate me, and in a selfish vein, I am blessed to have found someone that I cherish enough to keep trying to fix things - so that eventually our story will end: and they lived happily ever after.