Two Ships that Cross--Occasionally

This is the love of my life.

 

I waited and searched for what seemed like a long time to find him.

He's perfect to me and for me!

Some may argue, that he is just plain perfect!  I agree with that too.

 

Today we have been married for 11 amazing years. When I told my good friend it was our anniversay this weekend, she commented, "My, what you two have accomplished and experienced together in 11 years.  Can't wait to see and hear about the next 11".  As I think back, we have kept it lively.

We had our first son, Garrett, 9 months and 1 day after we were married.  Shortly after that, Keith graduated with his PhD from U of A, and we moved across country to Virginia to start our new job. Over the next few years we had four more kids, Kendall, Taryn, Alina and Landon.  When your youngest was 6 months and our oldest had just been baptized, Keith was made a Bishop in our church. Then somewhere through all those years, Keith received tenure at George Mason University and accomplished many wonderful things in his career.  Along with making babies, I have planted and killed a lot in our yard and managed to fill this house full of junk.  Not to mention all the fun and happy memories we have made on our many vacations and adventures together as a family

 

And now, our latest and biggest adventure together is facing this thing called cancer.  Before all of this, our lives had become a necessary, but happy routine.  Keith kept busy in his world, teaching at the university and doing all that was required of him to magnify his calling as the Bishop of our ward.  I would drive the kids from preschool to baseball to dance, wipe their noses, feed their bellies and then start the whole thing over the next day. Ocassionaly, our paths would cross and we would get a moment to eat dinner together or maybe see a movie.  But all in all, we lived in our own worlds, each of us taking care of our seperate responsibilities and we had, out of necessity, become two ships that ocassionally crossed in the night.

 

But that all changed the day I got my diagnosis.  When the weight of the realization of a cancer diagnosis hit me like a speeding freight train, I burried my face deep into the chest of this man I love and we wept together.  In that moment, there was no one else I wanted to hold me and nowhere else I wanted to be than wrapped up in the strong embrace of my eternal companion.  In that same moment, I realized that this togetherness, this oneness, was what we needed to be striving for all along.  Why did it take such a huge wakeup call like the C word to pull us out of our individual routines and back into a relationship that is fully focused on each other? 

 

Maybe that is one of the lessons we are to learn at the hands of this harsh taskmaster called cancer.  That beyond all the have to's and need to's of life, the one all important need we must fill first is to love and cherish and nurture each other. The cancer may have forced my hand on this, but it helped me remember that I have been blessed with an amazing, loving and faithful husband and partner.  Alone I may be week---but together with this man I love---I can do anything!  Happy Anniversary, Keith.  I love you!