Oh, those faces!   The way they look at each other!  Such joy.  Seriously, are you not smiling right now, just looking at them smiling at each other?  (I thought so….)  Steve & I never knew that our capacity for joy would only multiply when our CHILDREN felt joy.  It is surreal, like multiplied by a million, the way your heart can be so happy for their happiness.   No words.  It’s why a picture is worth a thousand of them.  (Thanks for indulging me in a parental, Mama Lori moment…._)

Wouldn’t it be great if we, as married couples, continued to look at each other this way – like past the wedding day & beyond to every day of all our days?  “Be real, Lori.  Like seriously?”     Like, seriously.    Humor me for a moment . . .

GUYS:  be honest.   Wouldn’t you kind of like it if your wife looked at you this way when you got home from work each day?   Or when you bumped into each other on your way out the door in the mornings?    And GIRLS, I’m pretty sure there’s not a one of us who wouldn’t love to see our husbands look at us like the picture above.  To be on the other end of THAT look…   Oh, how our hearts long for it.

“They are so young,” you say!  Yes.  They are young.   “They haven’t hit the realities of marriage yet, and how hard it can be….”  No, in the picture above, they had not yet experienced any of the hard moments, the hurts, and the challenges of marriage.  I get that:  but now they are 2.5 years in, and I can tell you from what I saw last night when they were standing in our kitchen…  they have – now – experienced a bit… and they are still looking at each other that way.    In fact, I know quite a few couples who have been married 10, 20, even 50 years …. and they still look at each other this way!  Maybe not all the time…  but they do look.   They see!    They smile.   And there is abundant joy!

FRIENDS!!   JOY is POSSIBLE!!    LOL!   Joy is actually the original INTENT of our GOOD Father who gives us such GOOD gifts when he gives us each other!!   This is actually to be our norm – and Steve and I believe it is not only possible, it is what marriage is meant to be!!    Now, we aren’t going to talk about the enemy any more today, but here’s the deal:  he really doesn’t want our marriages to work;  and if he can’t destroy them, he will at least try to steal from them.    Steal joy.   We’re writing today to say let’s take it back!   Let’s awaken again to JOY!

We love walking through Menards.  Well, STEVE loves walking through Menards, and I love walking with Steve!~  So it’s not uncommon that on many of our date nights, we will just need to stop in and make a Menards run!   He is excited because they’re running their 11% off sale, and I’m excited because I don’t really care…. about anything at the moment… except holding his hand!  I don’t have to plan where we go,  I don’t have a list or an agenda of anything that I, the wife, have to accomplish, so it’s kind of like being on vacation for 20 minutes …  I just hold his hand and skip along (yes, sometimes I skip), and we just go.     Have.     Fun.

And it occurs to me, as has happened so often these last few weeks of blogging, as I am in the very motion of typing those words, I am realizing why we love going to Menards!!!   Holy Spirit is revealing truth, and I am smiling and shaking my head, and answering Him, “Of course.  You’re right.   That’s exactly why we like to go to Menards!!!”  I just got it!    Like, right now.

I’m reading the phrases from above:  “I’m excited because I don’t really care… about anything except holding his hand… don’t have to plan… don’t have a list… or agenda…” And there you have it.  Girls:  when we don’t have cares-  or rather- when our cares don’t have us, when we’re not fixated on our plans, when we’re not obsessed with the list and our agenda of getting things done, or worried that they won’t, or stressing about the kids or the work load at work ….   wow,  we’re a whole lot more fun to be with!

Do you see it?   It could just be me.  But isn’t it true that on our wedding day, much like Bailey in the picture above, we only have ONE care in the world:  we just care about being with our man.   That’s all.  We are only fixated on one thing:  becoming his wife, and holding his hand, and when we look at him we see the one we want to walk through life with:  through highs and lows, through having kids and empty nests, through hard times and sad times … we just want to walk.   With him.

When did we start caring about more things, more than that?  More than him?  When did we stop looking at him and start looking at our lists, our agendas, our phones?  When did we stop being fun?

Contrast the two following scenes:  we’re going out on a date.  (Yes, we still date each other and we highly recommend that you married couples don’t ever stop …)  I bought a new dress; I’m going to sing, “I Feel Pretty”…  but my iTunes isn’t working as I get ready, and I just give up trying to fix it.   I go to put on my shoes, but realize our dog has been chewing on both heels… $#*@%#$.   Love that dog.  Ok.   Deeeeep breath, Lori.  I find just the right necklace and am putting it on… and trying to latch it, and still trying, but I can’t line it up because my eyes aren’t what they used to be… in fact, I can’t see it at all… and I’m starting to perspire, and I’m gritting my teeth…  and … FORGET THE NECKLACE!!!!!   AGHHHHHHH!.        DEEP,   DEEP BREATH.  And now he’s calling me, “Lor?  We’re gonna miss our reservation….  are you ready?”   And now I’m mad at myself for taking so long and frustrated we are going to have to rush… on a date..  and I say, a bit louder than I intended, “YES.  Dang it.  I’m coming…”     To which he retreats towards the car;  I follow.  He is walking carefully, considering the egg shells beneath his feet, and I am stomping, in my messed-up heels; and we get in the car and slam the door, and… he is not only not looking at me the way a girl longs to be looked at, he’s actually afraid to look at all.

Scene two:  it’s a late Sunday afternoon, we actually have a few hours to just plop on the couch and watch some football.  I put on my favorite sweats, and he is wearing like-wise, and we make some unhealthy queso for the chips, and I’m actually looking forward to just doing nothing, so I kiss him on the cheek, and steal the queso, and keep him from having any….   and – look at that.   What is he looking at?  He’s looking at me – like -what?  Like I had WANTED him to look at me on our date!   But he’s looking at me like that NOW?  I’m wearing my old sweats!  And he is smiling!

Could it be, girls, that what attracts our men to us is not the fab ensemble, or the hair fixed right…. but the heart of a girl who can just be.   And be fun???    Could it be that he finds me more beautiful when my heart is free and I can just be, no matter what I look like on the outside?  This is a phenomenon.  We girls may be a little slow.

And Steve is still smiling, and I say, “What?”   And I’m thinking he wants the queso, but now I’m starting to see…..  and he says, “Are we having fun now?”  with that hopeful grin on his face!    And I know he is happy to have me back.   To have me caring again, only just about him;  and letting the rest of the cares take a back seat,  letting my to-do lists wait till tomorrow, and letting the thought of tomorrow NOT steal my joy today.

I think I take the to-do of life a little too-seriously.   I think Father God designed us to trust him with our to-do;   He wants us just to-be.   I think the next time my to-do doesn’t go as planned, I need to just let it to-go.  To laugh.  To realize that the one I’m with is more important than the one thing I’m doing.  And the being with is more important than the getting done, and that loving well is the only thing.   to-care.   about.

So, friends.  Go have some fun this week.  Plan a date.  Or 2 hours at home – to just be.  Or go to a movie, and steal the popcorn.   And wake up and be present, and be aware of the one you love, and be …  fun.   And look at each other, and see.  See the one you saw back then, when you said, “I do.”   And don’t wait for the other to go first:  Men, your women will melt if you take time to look at them like that again.  It will CAUSE the cares to go!  And girls, let the rest go and look and see and smile and be.    Present.  Fun.  In-joy.  It makes you more attractive than you will ever know.