My wish for you is that you would experience one Monday evening like God blessed me with yesterday.

We’re now parents to amazing teenagers who are busy within their circles of friends.  It’s so awesome to watch them grow and learn and fail and succeed and pursue the person that God has created them to be.  They are well-rounded human beings, in large part due to their amazing mother who exhibits grace and love to them daily.  I pray that they recognize the life and love gift that God has blessed them with in their mom.

So we found ourselves alone on a Monday evening.  A French dip and loaded baked potato was the perfect and romantic dinner at McAlister’s Deli, sitting outside and taking in a beautiful East TN, May evening.  As cars were wizzing by through Turkey Creek, I sat and marveled that God had gifted you to me.  I don’t really remember what we talked about during our date night dinner but relish those precious moments sitting, talking, laughing and praying with you.

Then the evening exploded into frenzy (and anxiety for you) as we enhanced our date night with a trip to Costco for coffee and like all good Costco trips, leaving with $250 of “must haves.”  I love that we were so excited by the deals on La Croix, Goldfish, Doritos, Glucosamine Chondroitin (I’m old) and other things that contributed to a successful venture.  I love that you have to mentally prepare yourself for Costco or Sam’s Club and the type-A personalities that we will encounter as we navigate those aisles.

Then, as the proverbial cherry on top, you mentioned getting a hot fudge sundae.  The reality being you really just wanted hot fudge because you don’t love ice cream.  I love that we chose to drive through McDonald’s instead of going inside Freddy’s because we just wanted to be with one another.  After recovering from the trauma that McDonald’s no longer offers strawberry as a sundae topping, my ice cream cone was marvelous as I listened to you question the minimal amount of hot fudge topping your sundae.  From now on we’ll order hot fudge, complimented by a dollop of ice cream.  Man, rockstar life is awesome!

I love that as I was preparing to chill and do little else for the evening, you goaded me into going hunting for the snapping turtle that has invaded our pond with intent to ravage our fish.  A typical issues several times a year.  I love that we sat on the hillside watching the water as the sun went down, occasionally seeing our foe but never getting the safe and true shot.  We sat there quietly, listening to the tree frogs, watching fish cruise along the surface, whispering every now and then, just being together.  I pray that I never lose the feeling that overcomes me when I hear your voice whisper to me.  It is the melody of my life, echoing joy, commitment, love…so much love.

As I gave you a goodnight kiss and headed off to bed at the insane hour of 9:30 pm (do people really stay up that late on a regular basis?), I was overcome with the extraordinary gift of an ordinary evening with you.  Thank you for an uneventful and marvelously beautiful evening.  

“Two are better than one, because they have a good reward for their toil. For if they fall, one will lift up his fellow. But woe to him who is alone when he falls and has not another to lift him up! Again, if two lie together, they keep warm, but how can one keep warm alone? And though a man might prevail against one who is alone, two will withstand him—a threefold cord is not quickly broken.”  Ecclesiastes 4:9-12 (ESV)

You’re in my top-10 this morning.  Private joke!  SHMILY