Observations

There has been a slow but steady change in my life, especially dating back these past few months. My house is cleaner. Not because I was angry and taking it out on the bathroom tiles (which used to be the only way I would clean), but it is cleaner because little bit by little bit, unspeakingly, Josh and I have been working together to clean it and keep it more neatly. I don't know what has inspired this change in him, but I know why I have changed. I finally feel like this is my home and my life, my real life, is with him. I am finally more content being married to him than I was when I lived in my parent's house. And so I actually care. I can honestly say that despite work and taxes, these last few months have been the happiest of my life. And why? Because of those very few, always too few, moments that I wake up and find that he is next to me in bed, holding me, talking about his day. I am happy because I wake up a few hours later, and no matter which way I turn, he turns with me, wanting to be close to me. I am happy because I am loved.

Maybe the first few years of our marriage were so horrible because we were such horrible people, because we were young, because he was bored and I was scared, because he and I always have to make things hard. Except now we don't. Now we are easy.

He finally learned to trust me in the academy. And I think that in learning to forgive, and in being trusted, I am also finally learning to trust in return. I am content. Not because he is handsome and I am beautiful, but we are beautiful because of our contentedness. I can turn to him and him to me.

So as I write this from my desk, a desk which hasn't been able to be used since before my student teaching a year and a half ago because it was so messy. I like the order that our relationship is bringing to the rest of our lives. I think that the fruit of our hearts really does show in the physical world. What we sow, we reap, and have to live with. Not that there aren't still weeds, but I have never looked forward to the evening so much as now. And on Monday, when my allergies were so bad that I stayed home from school, I rejoiced because that meant I got to see him for a whole day (for the first time since Easter). It was a wonderful day. I've never been so happy, sick or well, as I am when I am with him.