I sent Jason off once again to Nevada to work. My older two daughters went with him to be deposited in Beaver at a good friend’s house on the way. I was happy, because Jason wouldn’t have to be driving all the way alone, and happy because I know that there will not be many more days of this left for us. Circumstances have come about and an opportunity at work has presented itself so that Jason will be home with us again for good in mid-September. They are transferring him to the South Jordan location of the University to fill a position that is being created and I can’t help but think how grateful I am that our house didn’t sell. How grateful I am that God knows and sees so much more.
Every grudged prayer that ended in “Thy will be done,” I only see as a blessing now. Every time I wanted to say, “no, Lord, please not Thy will but mine,” and I couldn’t, I am so pleased for now. He knows the picture and he knows us, and every time you wonder, “has he forgotten me?” know that he hasn’t. He just knows more, and he knows every in and out of what makes you greater. Every in and out of what leads to something better.
I turned on a movie when Jason left. A different sort of the same story of Beauty and the Beast, and when it ended it left me soaring as a good love story does. You cannot know the people who have said that I should enjoy the time alone, the chance to be and do whoever and whatever I want. But the thing that they don’t, and maybe can’t understand, is that like that fairy tale love in Beauty and the Beast, or Romeo and Juliet, Pride and Predjudice, or any other magical romance, I am not whole without Jason and he is not without me. I take a big long sweet rose smelling breath after a perfect love story and then I wrap my arms around myself and smile because that is my life.
Now I don’t know if that is how other’s marriages are, I know so many who say not, but mine is purely magical. Basic, boring, magically perfect. Not that we don’t ever disagree or even argue, but the way Jason looks at me, pretty much every moment of every second makes me tingle from head to toe. And the way he holds me in his strong arms and makes every ounce of this ordinary woman’s body feel tiny and dainty and soft and beautiful is what is magical. Eighteen years and still my heart aches when he is away.
So as he goes back to Henderson, for gratefully a shortened week this week, I thank God for the wonder that is my marriage. And I thank God for the blessings that are bringing us back together as a family once again.
