The little things mean so much

I had a great day yesterday. DH had been on call the night before, and didn't think he'd be able to check out in time to make it to church. No big whoop; what with being out of town the last two weeks of March and being on call every weekend since he's been back, he actually hasn't been to church with us in a month or more. I've gotten into a comfortable single mom routine: A routine which often involves pushing our diaper bag along the floor with my foot while dragging one screaming and/or flailing kid under each arm out of the chapel, so that others in the congregation can actually hear the service -- but hey, a routine is a routine.

I got myself and the girls all gussied up, made sure the diaper bag was well stocked with tasty cold water, fruit snacks, quiet toys and things to color, and off we went to church. They did well(ish) for the first half of the meeting, but then the girls started fighting over the fruit snacks and tossing a ball (how did that get in the bag?) against the wall, so I gathered up our stuff and hauled them out to the foyer for a talking-to on reverence and a drink of water from the short fountain (which my toddler can reach all on her very own, as she likes to remind me). And who should we run into in the hallway?

:-)

DH appeared as if out of nowhere -- exhausted, working on about 90 minutes of sleep, but there, dressed up in slacks and a button down shirt I'd ironed for him "just in case." He took the baby from me, I took the toddler's hand, and the four of us ventured back into the chapel to finish out the rest of the meeting quietly.

We sat together in Sunday School, too, after dropping the girls off at Nursery. We haven't done that in years, as his calling usually requires him to attend (or teach) the more basic class for new members. He put his arm across the back of my chair and angled his scriptures so that we could follow along in Exodous together (I never bring my own; I've already got too much of the girls' crap to carry, lol). Despite his sleep deprivation (or maybe because of it -- maybe to keep himself awake), he kept raising his hand to comment on the whiny, wandering Israelites and the ways in which human nature is still fundamentally the same. All the while, I just beamed: This is my husband, I thought, with a contentment I haven't felt in a long time.

The rest of the day passed more or less uneventfully. Everybody enjoyed a nice long nap after church; we had a cozy meal of Mac & Cheese for dinner; the toddler left a trail of pee from the far end of the living room to the bathroom in her mad dash to make it there on time. You know, the usual. DH went to bed not long after the girls did; I stayed up a while longer talking to my mom on the phone.

When I finally came to bed, DH was out cold. I lay down next to him and watched the slow rise and fall of his breaths, the little eyelid twitches of REM sleep, noted the curve of his arm wrapped around a pillow....

I'm weak. It's far too easy for me to get caught up in the stress of selling a house, the stress of quasi-single parenthood, the stress of money and the lack of it, the stress of not knowing quite what's in store for us just a few steps down the road. It's easy for me to resent the time demands of his chosen profession or his running hobby. I'm often frustrated by the way we only half hear each other, and the pointless little squabbles that result.

But yesterday felt so different. It felt like a rare moment of clarity: This is my husband. This is the man I married. When we first got together, I couldn't believe my good fortune -- I couldn't believe he'd waited 30 years only to end up with me! Luckeee! But five years of quotidian banality and two adorably energetic children later, I don't pause often enough to appreciate how good I have it with him.

I do have it pretty good. He's amazing. My life is amazing.


~RCH~