Hey guess what? I'm getting married in two days! Woohoo!!It's been a long time coming but it feels like time has gone by so fast! Alison and I have been engaged for the last 19 months. I remember a point in time where the wedding was something that existed off in the distant, hazy future. Now it's almost here.
Even though nobody will probably read this, let me recount for you a little bit of our story: I have never really been one who was good at coloring inside the lines. As a matter of fact, when we used to have coloring contests in grade school, I never once had my work exibited. I was threatened with summer skool to help me with my handwriting as well. For the most part, my handwriting still looks like that of a fifth grader. As I become more and more educated, one of the things that spurs me on as skool has become so wearisome to me is that if I just get some kind of doctoral degree, my terrible handwriting will be explained away by my over educated brain. Doctors are supposed to write sloppy, right? Anyway, I've never been one to color inside the lines or do things the easy or proper way. So, when Alison came into my life late in the August of 2007 (ok so technically I started Facebook stalking her about this time, but since she responded to me it was kinda like she came into my life), after spending three or four weeks adamantly refusing to define our relationship, on October 13, I proposed to her that we get married. Aparently she thought this was a good idea, or that it at least sounded interesting, because she concurred that that was in fact a great idea and we should pursue it.
So the first time I met my inlaws to be was when I sat down and told them I was going to be marrying their daughter. Yeah, I know most people don't do things that way, but given that my dad and grandpa had both met and married their wives within about 3 months and 2 weeks respectively, in a way I was just following Lawrence protocol. I figure since both dad and pops are still married after all these years, there's probably no correlation between length of engagement/knowing your spouse to be and length of marriage. After a lovely dinner (I think we had salmon), her parents suggested that I get Alison an engagement ring. Again, most people buy those BEFORE they pop the question, but how was I supposed to know I was going to ask her to marry me that weekend?
Given that we "dated" for such a brief time before getting engaged, when her parents requested we wait until Alison graduated before we got married, I figured that was a fair enough concession to make on my part. Being the open minded person I am, I knew that them city folks do things different up there :)
So, we've been engaged for 19 months now. I think Alison has had a ring on her finger for about 18 of those months :) In that time I finished an internship, finally got my B.A. and graduated with honors, started seminary, come to realize my hopes for seminary were sorely misplaced, and lived in three different places (including spending last summer living in Naperville with Alison and her parents). Alison and I have been completely goofy infatuated with each other, we have learned how to kiss (boy that was awkward at first, lot's of slobbering involved in that learning curve!), I've made her cry for the first time, we've had our first fight, we've had many many subsequent fights, we've put on winter weight and then got back on the road to being healthy again, and we've begun learning to live on very little. 
One thing we have both noticed as we have been engaged is the negative attitude so many people have towards marriage. We've encountered this from just as many people within the church as we have from those outside the church or in the mindless drivel on TV like 2 1/2 "men" or everybody loves raymond. Now I'll admit, it's nine kinds of frustrating when you find yourself trying to be a good significant other and student and worker all at the same time. I've come within a breath of smashing my phone on the ground or throwing it against the wall at least twice in the last school year after a heated conversation over the text messenger.
When I look at the prospect of being married, I'm reminded of Peter's response to Jesus after a bunch of people quit following Him and Jesus asked Peter if he was going to hit the road too. Peter said, "Dude, where else is there to go? You are the way to life!" (my paraphrase). I think marriage is a lot like that. I think our society is so utterly selfish and bent on immediate gratification that there is a stereotype of the "independent" man or woman who is successful in business and cannot be hindered by being obligated to an other. Rather, this independent person is "free" to engage in sexual relationships as he or she sees fit without becoming emotionally atatched to the other person.
I guess this stereotype is great and liberating except for the fact that we have this innate, inborn desire to be known by an other (Other). And that generally in life the biggest disappointment we ever face is getting to do whatever we want or getting what we want in general. I would say it is amazing except that it ultimately creates people who have grown into materialistic, hopeless, selfish shells of what a human being has the potential to become through selfless love of an other (Other).
[Sidenote: I took a couple melatonin about half an hour ago and now it's going on 10 so this may have to be a two part post]
Over the last year and a half, I have had to make some sacrifices. I haven't played nearly as much Xbox as I used to. I lived in a place that was almost completely antithetical to everything I value in life. I've spent about three times as much as I used to spend when it was just me (turns out most people don't want to eat pinto beans for supper 5 nights a week, go figure!). In general, almost every day I have had to suspend my own selfish desires for instant gratification and put the good of Alison as an individual and our relationship as a couple above my own selfishness. You know the funny thing? This has been one of the most liberating experiences of my life! It ranks right up there with getting sober and then realizing that sobriety wasn't just tolerable, but preferably to constant innebrieation.
To wrap this up, I'm not the same person I was 19 months ago. In a lot of ways, the stereotypes are right. I don't do as much of what I used to do since I've been engaged. But that's a good thing! Without realizing it, when I got engaged I entered into a lifestyle, a way of training and disciplining myself, that has helped me to begin to move beyond the hopelessness of fulfilling my own selfish desires by putting the good of another in front of my own.
I look forward to continuing to find myself as I loose myself in this covenant called marriage. By God's grace I will become less as Christ is formed in me through the process of loving Alison.
