"Mawage. Mawage is wot bwings us togeder tooday. Mawage, that bwessed awangment, that dweam wifin a dweam... And wuv, tru wuv, will fowow you foweva... So tweasure your wuv." In the beloved classic Princess Bride, there is a wedding scene where the villain, Prince Humperdinck, is attempting to rush his marriage to Princess Buttercup. Like the rest of the film, the scene is funny with a questionable priest talking about " Mawage and twu wuv", a coerced princess, and an egotistical prince. It's all part of what makes a fabulous fairy tale satire.
Mawage brought my husband and I together 34 years ago. It was a glorious sunny day in Chicago, neither too hot nor too cold - just perfect. And unlike the fictitious Buttercup, I wanted to be there. My farm boy's name was Cliff, and he wasn't the quiet "as you wish" type.
We celebrated with people from Cyprus, Lebanon, Greece, Pakistan, Turkey, Palestine, Israel, Saudi Arabia, China,Taiwan, and the United States. At one point we looked out on the crowd and saw people from three different countries in conflict sitting next to each other - they were smiling and in that snapshot, we suddenly knew the ceremony was far bigger than we were. The top of our wedding cake was an edible globe of the world - a sweet reminder that we wanted our celebration to reflect God's world and his sacrificial love for the world.
While the Princess Bride ceremony was satire, our ceremony was serious. We knew the vows we took were bigger than we were and represented a mystery and sacrament that we did not fully understand.
Fast forward 34 years and marriage is still a mystery, still something we stand by as hard and good and brave. Much has changed - five children, significant others, and arguably the cutest grandson on ever earth. We no longer have the bone tired joy of parenting toddlers, we have the wakeful nights of loving, and sometimes not understanding, adult children.
We still don't completely understand the vows we took. We will never fully get the mystery of marriage this side of eternity. But what we do know makes us tremble in its impossibility and stand in awe of its delight and difficulty.
We will be the first to say that if it was about us, we would have failed many times over. This journey, which began in an impossibly sweet and unconventional ceremony, took us on roads and trails, into airports and houses, entering countries and territories with a lot of laughter, a fair share of anger, and heartbreak that only God could repair.
In one of my favorite books, Hannah Coulter by Wendell Berry, Hannah talks about looking back on marriage:
"When you are old you can look back and see yourself when you are young. It is almost like looking down from heaven. And you see yourself as a young woman, just a big girl really, half awake to the world. You see yourself happy, holding in your arms a good, decent, gentle, beloved young man with the blood keen in his veins ....."
She goes on to talk about how this man and this love are going to disappear into a " storm of hate and flying metal and fire. And you just don't know it." While she is writing about war, many of us could write about how this love and this man are sometimes going to disappear - disappear into a storm of ill spoken words and unthought out actions, a storm of misunderstanding and just plain meanness - and you just don't know it. But you keep on living and you keep on loving, because some day it will get better. And in the better that comes you rest easy and joyful, you laugh and talk as though the world can never stop your words or your love.
And that's us on this day. We've both spoken words we regret. We've had sadness and meanness. We've struggled to make it. But we just kept on living, and praying, and then a new day came and we began to love again. This is life and marriage in its circle of hope and defiance of its critics.
So we stand today declaring the value of a brave marriage and ready to face the next chapter.
And with humility and excitement we announce that our next chapter will take us to Northern Iraq where we will be working at the University of Raparin in the city of Rania. It is unexpected and yet so welcome. For the past five years we have wanted to spend more time in the Middle East. Whenever we come back from short trips we enter back into the U.S. with a longing to return as soon as possible to the Middle East. The prospect of being able to come alongside this university in our professional roles of nursing and grants administration feels like a tremendous gift.
So this anniversary comes with gratitude and expectation for the next chapter of our brave marriage. We hope you'll continue to follow along!
The story is not over; the journey continues....Some days, it feels as though it is still just beginning.*
*from Worlds Apart: A Third Culture Kid's Journey
