Day 64: A longing fulfilled...

And now, the post you've all been waiting for!  Okay, maybe that's overstating it a bit...  I'm sure you all have lives, but I suspect that some of you may want know how my husband's 24-hour pass went, so read on...

On November 26th my husband officially completed his second month in recovery and was granted a 24-hour pass to leave campus.  The kids and I picked him up almost promptly at 11:00 on Saturday morning, and thus ensued our 24 hour journey from awkward to awesome!

Before I can explain the awesome, I must first address the awkward.  Our last visit just over two weeks ago was no es bueno (not good).  I didn't write about it then because I needed time and space to process it all, but long story short, it is difficult to cultivate a new relationship in a petri dish.  We are not single-celled organisms.  We are a living breathing family of many organisms and trying to connect in a house full of strangers is extremely challenging and stressful, and there is no normal to be found.

I came away from that visit feeling lonely, dejected, and confused, and the next day when my husband called me, I spent most of the conversation crying. He tried to encourage my by reminding me that he was almost due for his 24-hour pass, but to no avail.  I spent the next several days feeling sullen and angry while dreaming wistfully of returning to "Egypt".

As the weekend of the 24-hour pass approach, I learned that the "conjugal" nature of our visit was on more minds than just mine and my husband's, which was, uhm...awkward.  Several people asked if our kids would be with us on the visit and what we were going to do with them so that we could you know... As it turned out, my sister and her husband were going to be out of town, so they gave us a key to their place (leaving their room to us, the guest room to our girls, and the living room to our boys), and told us to have fun playing house...and we did.  Nuff said!  ;-)

In spite of the weekend's occasional first-date-like awkwardness (like not knowing what to talk about at lunch and my husband waking up before 7 am ready to start the day, and me saying uhm no, I'll be staying in bed until 9 am, but you are more than welcome to stay with me...), it was full of so much awesomeness that I came home fairly bursting with joy!  Highlights included, but were not limited to: walking in the rain with my husband...putting dishes away with my husband...cuddling on the couch with my husband (while watching a ridiculous movie with our children)...laughing, talking, and crying into the wee hours of the morning with my husband...conjugal-ness (not a word, I know) with my husband...breakfast at Starbucks with my husband...grocery shopping with my husband.  (You could substitute almost any activity, and if it included with my husband, my heart would sing!)

But the icing on the cake was on Sunday morning...  We had just finished discussing the "proper" time to get out of bed, and I seemed to have won (apparently I hold more allure than coffee or a shower because my husband elected to stay), but like a ninny, I ruined the victory by beginning to fret about a situation involving our oldest son.  My husband rolled over, took my hand in his, and said, "Let's just pray about it.  God will take care of him." "Uhm," ...stunned silence... "okay," was my reply, as I curled into his chest and closed my eyes...

He had me at, "Let's just pray..."

“...a longing fulfilled is a tree of life.”  (Proverbs 13:12)