Doug and I have been together for nineteen years. We’ve been married fifteen of them. At first he balked at my traditions. He’d leave the house Thanksgiving morning, to get away from the hustle and bustle of dinner prep. He’d insist there was no reason to have the Christmas party again this year, because we’d had it the year before, and the year before that. He’d come along kicking and screaming to get a Christmas tree, and then insist we could decorate it the next weekend.
I didn’t really see it happen, his acquiesence to my routine, it just did. On Thanksgiving day he must’ve asked me five times if I wanted to decorate on Friday. I was ambivalent. We got up Friday morning and hit the Y as a family, getting in a much needed workout. Then, he asked me if I minded if we stopped by Walmart (on Black Friday, was he crazy?). We did, and I remembered we live in Monument, the parking lot was only half full.
On the way home, he asked again, should we decorate today. I gave in. It dawned on me then that our roles switched. He was pushing for something that seemed important to him, so I agreed to do it. By mid-afternoon we were finished. We had help, the boys are older, it went quickly and seamlessly. So unlike most holiday traditions.
This morning, the house looks beautiful. And I’m so thankful we decorated, because now I get to sit and enjoy the stillness and peace of it. The quiet lasted all of twenty minutes, before the rest of the house woke and joined me. No longer still, the movement and noise was welcome, because the peace remained.
As I look back on my thirty days of thankfulness, I realize I barely scratched the surface of all that I’m thankful for. The rest sits in my heart, where gratitude builds every day, and stays. I am blessed. My life is full of stillness and quiet, chaos and noise. It is also filled with more love than one person could possibly deserve.
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