Less ME, More WE

I have been Mrs. Huck for 9 years.  Sometimes I think that is a very long time and we feel more like newlyweds, and other times I think "wow, so much has happened - four houses, three kids, one on the way - how can it only be nine years?"  One of my Dad's favorite sayings is that spouses grow to look like each other.  I'm not sure I'm starting to look like Nathaniel, but I am certain I look less and less like Melissa.  But not outwardly - in the way I think, talk, plan, believe, dream.  I look less like me and more like "we."  And I'm good with that.  I will take that as a win.  I hope, over time, our friends will not see us as individuals, but as The Hucks.  When one of us pops into your mind you can't help but think of the other.

This whole "two become one" thing is a bit of an elusive idea, though.  In part because our society has sold us this idea that if you preserve a little part of yourself - you know, "don't loose your identity" - that will somehow save your marriage in the end.  C R A P.  How many old married couples, the ones who are genuinely happy, have you ever heard talk about their separate hobbies, separate bank accounts, those pieces of their lives they held aside?  I don't hear my parents talk about all the times in the last 34 years that they did their own thing.  Their marriage has always been about the same thing their parents' marriages were about: "WE."  They sold out for the mission.  The mission of finding out what it looks like when Ted and Margie become "The Naegels."  And quite successfully I might add.  Not without it's bumps along the way, it's imperfections, the occasional roadblock.  But that makes it all the more worth while!!  They have conquered the junk as a WE, and they can enjoy the fruits of their labor with someone else, and talk about the stuff that happened along the way that no one else knows about.  Marriage is the ultimate inside joke, one of the biggest adventures, and it has a big payoff:  you wake up next to someone every day who, no matter what, has your back.  But only if you sell out to it, and loose yourself in it.

Sometimes marriage brings tragedies and heartbreak when one spouse is lost too soon.  But even then, have you ever heard someone say "I wish I hadn't gotten married" when they are widowed too soon?  No!  They tell the stories of challenges met, hurdles jumped, the race that was run together.  And it cuts deeply because it was a race worth running, and adventure they wish was still happening!

The thing that makes it work is to put on love.

"So, chosen by God for this new life of love, dress in the wardrobe God picked out for you: compassion, kindness, humility, quiet strength, discipline. Be even-tempered, content with second place, quick to forgive an offense. Forgive as quickly and completely as the Master forgave you. And regardless of what else you put on, wear love. It's your basic, all-purpose garment. Never be without it." Colossians 3:12-14  


You will not make it to the finish without the kind of love that wakes up every morning and chooses to be second to your spouse, chooses to love unconditionally, chooses to put the other first. You cannot keep a little part of yourself tucked away for a rainy day, or waste your time fighting to keep some of your identity. You have to put it all out there and SELL OUT to the WE!
If anything, The Hucks are certainly on an adventure.  We threw our "white picket fence life" out the window a number of years ago and we're much happier to let God write the next chapter and guide our path.  And we are in this thing together.  My family will always be there for me, and so will his.  But ultimately, it's the two of us and the children we've been blessed with, and whatever happens we'll conquer it together.  It will frequently look messy, and it will be something we both work at every single day.  But when we are old and wrinkly and Nathaniel is finally in his rocking chair on the front porch telling our grandkids stories that will make our children mad, we will think of all we allowed God to accomplish in our marriage because we sold out for the cause and became a WE.  And it will be good.