I Miss it Being “Us”.
Can I confess… I miss it being “us”.
This week I looked at my husband and said, “I miss you. I miss having long evenings together. I miss talking in the car while we travel. Even talking over the sink doing dishes is something I would love to do again.”
It’s the little mundane things that I miss the most. The quiet moments where we were all talked out and just chose to be together quietly. Of course, he’s still the one I text multiple times a day to tell a funny story. Or more often to ask for prayer when I’ve had it up to “here” with a particular child. But that kind of talking feels so different.
We used to be one of those sappy couples that said “you hang up first” until finally, we realized neither of us was going to do it and fell quiet. Hours later I would wake to find I had fallen asleep still on the phone. Our phone calls this year are rushed “team meetings”. Usually on the topic of who is getting potatoes for supper and if I have time to work out that evening. Somehow kids can sense when the phone rings and they save up all their mischief for that moment.
I would never wish away our kids. I love raising them with him. I’m so grateful we are a team. Having the same vision is part of what attracted us to each other. But in this time of life, even as we live out the vision we had, it’s easy to become overwhelmed. Evenings find us chasing a kid for a new diaper, while the other chases down another one covered in mud. By the time we get everyone put to bed, our words have been all used up.
Being united by a common goal is so bonding. If we didn’t have that it would be easy to lose each other. Life now is the dream we painted for each other 11 years ago. But if I’m honest, sometimes I look in the mirror and I don’t know what happened. I don’t recognize who I’ve become, and what this life we’re building is.
Sure pieces of it I knew would be there. Little people with brown hair and a spray of freckles across their noses. One that’s thoughtful like him. One determined like me. We are welcoming friends invited and uninvited into our home multiple times a week just like we knew we would.
But other pieces feel like a shoe that won’t break in. Things like going to bed early. Waking up to people crying. Who in the world signed off on two children with taxes, a mortgage, and 401K? Is that what the plan was? Play “keeping house”. When did this become the real thing?
After our shared moment, we both teared up; took a couple of minutes to share our favorite memories together; then we heard crying in the kid’s play area and went to assist. But it found like we had found a piece of “us” to share, even in the middle of the chaos.
