Not Yet Arrived

Jim and I recently celebrated our 26^th wedding anniversary.  Twenty-six years.  Just writing that causes me to pause. 

I’ve now been married for longer than I was unmarried.  More years of my life have been spent as a wife than spent as a child and young woman.  I’ve known my husband for more years than the years during which I did not know him.  For that matter, I’ve been a mother for longer than I was not a mother.  No matter how I look at it, this thought staggers me. 

Leaving the Driving to Him

When I was little, we would occasionally take day-trips or be out at a friend’s home, requiring a late-night return to our own house.  As we drove home in the dark I would often fall asleep in the car.  Though I was sleeping, I was aware enough of the movement of the car, coming to a gradual stop at a traffic light or intersection, gently pulling away from the stop, the sound of the turn signal, abnormally loud in the quiet of the night.  I knew that, without watching his every move, my Dad was carefully piloting our family through the dark streets and we would eventually pull into the driveway where he would stop the car, turn the key, and we’d be home.