December 1st

Will here.

I love Christmas - always have. The lights, the cold, the fires in fireplaces, the friends in town, the family visits, the awesome food, the fantastic music... It never gets old for me.

But this year, Christmas means something extra special. Yes, it will be the end of a long and demanding semester, and for that I am grateful. What I'm thinking of, though, is much bigger.

Clare and I will be celebrating our first Christmas as a married couple.

As I write this, the night is passing into morning and plenty of work remains to be done, but I am just overwhelmed by my situation at this very second. Clare and I are married. Still totally blows my mind. We live in a quaint little apartment in the heart of Belhaven. We went and picked out a Christmas tree for our place yesterday and had to ask the folks if they had anything smaller they could show us. It was fantastic! We really are at such a unique junction in our lives together, and I'm just thankful for it - for all its quirks, its bursts of laughter, its understandings that the important things in life don't cost a dime.

When Clare and I were early on in our courtship, we used to lament the fact that there were so many years separating us from where we were then to that ONE DAY when we would, in front of God and everyone, be married. After feeling sorry for ourselves for a little while, we finally realized how much fun we were having just being right where we were. 'Besides,' we said, 'What's six years in the span of sixty?' How true that's been, even with the little time we've had.

But yes, I am amazed and humbled to be at such a spot in my life. Clare, you are wonderful - thank you for agreeing to share your time on this planet with me. That is just too cool.

So, in sum: Med school = finite. Challenges / Obstacles = come and go. Getting to spend the first of many, many Christmas' with the woman you love = just no beating that.

Welcome, December! You are always a sight for sore eyes.

Best to all of you,
Will

PS - Found a neat quote that I think is worth sharing. It's a Serbian proverb: "Be humble for you are made of earth. Be noble for you are made of stars." Just excellent.

Marriage Makes Me Marvel

Will here -

As Clare has noted in her posts, marriage has been anything but "settling." In a way, of course, Clare and I do feel much more settled now than ever before in the sense that we have found our life partner, that person with whom we have each decided to spend the rest of our lives. To repeat: the rest of our lives. That is a big deal, and I think it is precisely because it is such a big deal that getting / being married has thrown not just our relationship into stark relief, but also our own lives and what we want out of them. Essentially, marriage is the first decision that we have made that bears with it the connotation of an entire lifetime. Neither one of us entered into it lightly, and neither one of us has since been able to shake the shocking feeling of mortality that comes with a lifetime decision.

Not that this is a bad thing. In fact, I think we'd both say it's been quite the opposite - finally, a full-fledged, no-bones-about-it reason to take a step back, re-evaluate, re-examine, re-set the compass, re-read the maps, re-think the pathway, re-visit our inner selves, re-explore what really makes us tick.