THE "M" WORD

Mummy?

Men?

Marigolds?

Nope. It's MARRIAGE. Which in itself, purely in terms of how it sounds, is to me a scarily grown up and serious word [Like... carriage...?]. But that's probably not a bad thing. If it sounded trivial and somewhat limp, [like... snog? flump? fling?] that would not be a good start.

Anyways, I'm writing about it because... as I hinted at in a previous post, I am ENGAGED [a slightly softer, more comfortable word yet still with a serious undertone]. It's taken me a month or two for that to sink in, as I never imagined I would be the one wearing a ring, planning a wedding, etc - well not at this age anyways. For most of my life I assumed it would either never happen to me, or if it did it wouldn't be for a long time. I determined not to be someone who sat around waiting for her life to begin when she finally was whisked away my the man of her dreams. Firstly, life's too short, and secondly the image that puts in my mind is of a period drama woman draping herself over furniture and gazing wistfully out of windows. Even if I tried, I could not pull off meek, (no offence, but slightly pathetic?!), dreamy period-drama-woman. Thirdly, throughout my life I've heard it said hundreds of times: "don't worry, there's someone waiting just for you" or lines along a similar vein. However, my logical mind reasoned that there are in fact more women than men in the world (and if looking for someone who shares my beliefs the ratio is even less in a woman's favour) so how could anyone possibly guarantee that? Fourthly, I probably secretly really did like the idea of spending my life with someone but didn't believe I'd be someone's choice of partner so I made myself believe I was really fine being 'just me' so that I wouldn't get disappointed later in life (phew, long sentence!).

And I actually was fine with all that, then a young man strolled in to my life and bit by bit over the last couple of years we've both changed and grown towards each other and like each other a whole big fat lot, and now we've decided to commit to each other for the rest of our lives. Which is HUGE!! yes there is a wedding to plan and that's also something I'd never really thought about before but that is one day and nothing compared to the thought of preparing for a whole life time. Which I guess, is kind of impossible. Because who knows what life will bring? The point is we'll be walking the road together. Even with regards to this year, there are very few things I'm certain about i.e. job, somewhere to live, etc apart from the fact that as of September I'll be facing these unknowns with Mr Q at my side.

And that is a great thing.

Obviously there are things we already do together, and we see each other a lot, so I guess the question for a lot of people in a society where marriage is becoming less and less common is: "what's the point?". Well for us it will be a big change. We won't live together until we are married, which again is quite a crazy concept to many people, and yes it is a risk because for example, there are probably lots of little habits we haven't noticed about each other that might annoy the hell out of us! BUT i kind of think that love should involve some kind of risk. Don't take this as me being flippant, I am not expecting everything to be hunky-dory, and I don't think we should make things hard for the sake of it. However, Commitment doesn't mean anything if we can get out of it at the slightest difficulty. Love is a choice, it doesn't give up, it doesn't keep a record of wrongs (see 1 Corinthians 13 in the New testament for an amazing, challenging description of love). And that idea of committing to someone, whatever happens, is the most powerful expression of love I can think of. Because we will make this commitment, [or oath, or covenant --> deep, heavy, beautiful words] before God and before our friends we will be well and truly bound to one another - which is terrifying yet amazing. And i think it's the best way to lay a foundation for doing life together.

So going back to preparing, I guess what we've been focussing on is being able to be totally open and honest with each other (something I'm still not great at!) and working out how to really be a team, to regain the distance between us when for whatever reason we might have drawn apart.

So there's some of my thoughts... which I've just let spill out as I type, which is interesting because I then realise a bit more of what's going on inside me! I'm just at the beginning of this adventure, and I know there will be plenty of challenges and lots to learn, but today i'm saying HOORAY, I can't wait to marry Mr Q :-)