Becoming a Minnesotan

It is some kind of gorgeous here today. Like greenest greens and bluest blues and I can still see the lake through the not-as-bare trees, glistening just beyond our backyard.
This is the time of year when Scout doesn’t want to come inside; why would she? Right now she and the Bulldogs are sunning themselves on the porch. The bullies are laying on their sides, looking like pigs ready to roast at a luau.
Summer is around the corner. (I know this because I’ve already seen a few giant mosquitoes.) Every day the grass gets greener, and it amazes me how life comes back. What was once frozen, dormant, cold and hard, springs forth greener and more vibrant than I remember it. Life comes back again and again and again.
One year ago today we pulled into our driveway very late at night, newly married and with dogs in the backseat. I spent the next month unpacking and cleaning (so much cleaning) and organizing, and made this house our home.
They say that the first year of marriage is the hardest, and this is perhaps a turn of phrase that single people don’t understand. I didn’t, really.
And while yes, every adventure is new, it’s difficult to blend 30+ years of habits and stuff and expectations. I thought I might go a little bit bananas those first few months, trying to figure out how to keep clean a house that is inhabited by four dogs and a man. It felt like such an impossible task. But now I have my routine down, and I gave up the ghost on keeping the kitchen floor truly clean. (A large mat by the sliding door has helped, but really. We have four dogs. Who was I kidding?)
Add on to those first trials my grief, such grieving. I lost my precious grandmother. My heart was broken by death and loss and such intense homesickness for a placed I’d only lived six years. Sometimes I don’t know how I made it.
Winter is dark. One day it’s summer, and suddenly the next it is briefly fall and the sun is setting just after lunch, it seems. And the weather is to-the-bone cold; cold like I never knew existed outside storybooks about Santa and penguin movies in Antarctica. But I survived winter, and the natives give credit to anyone who does, whether it’s someone’s first or forty-first tundra season. I am proud of this surviving.
But it’s over now. The ice is off the lake. Boats are out of storage, and restaurant patios are open. My yard is green again. Our windows are up and my feet are bare.
I survived. I’m at home.

My Future Mother Self

I’m home alone today with our two old lady dogs, Montego and Julie. I got to sleep in this morning to a ridiculous hour, which never ever happens. (Whoever said dogs aren’t like kids doesn’t have a dog like Scout who wakes up with the sun every single morning and prances around until you join her. There is no sleeping in at our house.)
This weekend is fishing opener in Minnesota, which means my husband has been on a lake already about three times, chasing after that state record Walleye. Fishing opener trumps all else, so I imagine future Mother’s Days will be much of the same. And that is just fine.
I was e-mailing with a friend yesterday, and she said she was wishing us a happy mother’s day to our future mother selves, and I appreciated the sentiment so much. Sometimes I already feel like someone’s mother that I have to remember that I am, in fact, not.
I’ve had three newborn sessions so far in my little fledgling photography business, and there is just nothing like the chance to scoop up a brand new baby and cuddle him close to you cheek, and shush him to sleep. Their brand new moms are often surprised by my confidence and ability to do so, since I am, after all, no one’s mother.
Several years ago I read an ugly, sarcastic comment on one of those “slam book” sites about how they just couldn’t wait to read about my infertility struggles in a few years. For whatever reason that comment has stuck with me, both because I longed so badly for it to not be a forewarning, while most of me knew that it was.
This has been a challenging year for me. God has really been working me over. Why was it so easy for me to trust in Him when it came to my singleness? (Okay, easy isn’t the right word, but I got there, confident in his timing and plan.) But this feels so much different.
It is very difficult to articulate my feelings on the topic, because I feel wholly of two hearts on the matter. One part of me wants to feel anger and rage at the sky that I can’t just get pregnant the way it was designed to happen. I mean, why can’t I? Why me? Wasn’t this intense longing for children placed in my heart by God? Why would He not grant it as easily to me as He grants it to millions? As easily as He grants it to people who do not even WANT it?
It is extremely difficult for me to read comments from mothers complaining about their children or pregnancy, though in some microcosmic way I get it. My dogs drive me bananas, but I still love them. I get it in that sense, I suppose, but to whine about a miracle… that I do not understand. Especially when I would give up everything to experience it. Everything.
My brother and sister-in-law are expecting again, and the day they found out the baby is a girl, the day that my sister-in-law sent an e-mail saying that the face in the ultrasound looks like me, I sat in my car and cried and cried. And they were nothing but tears of joy, because I feel like God is giving me this niece as a balm. Here here, He is saying. Here is a baby, though not a daughter, a baby who you will love, who will share Josephine’s legacy. Here.
And this Easter, I got to cuddle and photograph a toddler boy who has eyes and cheeks and a grin like my husband’s, and I have to ask Him, is this to tide us over or is this going to be it?
But my other heart is stoic about the matter. This is how it will be for us, and that is okay. Why NOT me? Why do I deserve something just because I desire it? I deserve nothing but death. I deserve nothing.
And so I cling to the promise that He works all things for good for those who love Him and are called according to His purpose.
“I know that You are for me. I know that You will never forsake me in my weaknesses. I know that You have come down, even if to write upon my heart. To remind of who You are.” – You Are For Me, Kari Jobe
So I will walk this path that He has set before us, and I will accept it and I will not stomp my feet and cry why me, no matter how badly I want to, because why me, God? Why would you save me? Why would you love me? I am a liar, a wretch, a whore. And yet You saved me and made me Your bride.
“You have already won the battle, and You’re got great plans for me, though I can’t always see.” – “Free to Be Me,” Francesca Battistelli

52 weeks later

While our anniversary is technically tomorrow, I tried to convince Aaron that it’s really today, since we were married on a Friday night. He didn’t buy it.
But it’s close enough for me.
Even just a year later, you start to forget a lot of the little things. Last night we were talking about the day, and I couldn’t remember if I sat with my family at the restaurant before or after I worked out. Or what exactly happened with the Chick-fil-a party platter mix up (only remembering that there was one, and that it was truly the only thing to go “wrong” all day).
A year later you remember the moments. Waiting with the bridesmaids, my dad and Adam before the processional, and how we all had to eat Adam’s crackers so that he wouldn’t try to carry the baggie down the aisle with him. How Michael took his stuffed puppy with him, and handed it to one our guests halfway down the aisle. How my dad whispered in my ear, “Good luck honey,” as he hugged me after giving me away. And how that was the only moment I truly thought I might lose it.
It was a fun, wonderful, amazing day that I can’t believe is already a year behind us.
But as all married people know, a marriage is so much more than a wedding. Everyone tells you that, but when you’re a bride, it’s all you can do to think about the honeymoon after the wedding, you’re so consumed with details and to-do lists.
I had no idea what this year would have in store for me. The deaths and this job and how difficult it has been acclimating to a new climate and culture. (It’s definitely a different culture!)
There is so much more to say, and I plan to say it. But for now, I just want to remember.
Getting ready:

First glance:

I loved my bouquet so very much:

That boot camp paid off:

Aaron waiting at the end of the aisle:

This picture is so special to me. I’m so glad my uncle was right there with his camera!

On the beach:

The end of the reception ended up being a karaoke fest. If there is a microphone anywhere, Roger will end up with it. Be warned.

I’ll never forget it.
(All photos by Todd Pellowe.)

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