Through The Years
On December 11th of this year, my wife and I celebrated 25 years of a union that for me has been transformative and instructional. The institution of marriage has been caricatured to the point that many couples who have considered entering into its sacred bonds are anxious, if not discouraged.
I have often stated that the primary challenge with a lot of people that decide to get married shortly after meeting each other is that they enter into it in a chemically-altered state. The avalanche of endorphins and the almost Pollyannish view in which some begin this covenant make the inevitable challenges that will present themselves hostile and seismic in the shaking of their love-engorged foundation. When two hearts beat as one, their lives begin as an amalgamation of different ideologies, world views, expectations and life experiences.
Neither of us had been spouses or parents before yet we were embarking on a lifelong pursuit which by default included one and aspirationally would involve the other. We began as lovers, friends, confidants and partners in building a home, a micro-economy that would serve as the first society our children would ever be exposed to. At a very organic level, this union was a demonstration of ex nihilo- we were fashioning a life out of the simple belief that our love was immutable and eternal.
Each year would expand our roles, our responsibilities and our sense of self. Within the first two anniversaries we grew from babe and sweetie to the life-changing title of mommy and daddy. As I watched my wife's body transform into this spectacular repository for our child to grow and be nurtured in the safety of her womb, nothing could have prepared me to witness the second greatest miracle in my life-the birth of our first born ( the first being salvation through Christ). Anniversaries are ostensibly chronological milestones. But as I reflect on the one score and five that my wife and I have shared, they really are moments in time in which you can reflect/pause on just how the events-planned and mostly unplanned-have influenced the tapestry that is your life together.
We met as college students. My sojourn was an expectation, my wife's a departure from the norm. The two became one flesh and and that merging of soul, body and spirit became the foundation for us to evolve into a plethora of other titles, integration into a variety of professional, community and religious circles and ultimately craft the future that we so eagerly sought to explore. We don't tend to use the term matriculation when it comes to marriage. However, in reflecting, that is essentially what Stacy and I have done. We started as child-less, young professionals who quite frankly had to feel our way through the unique dynamic that was to be the Stallworth household.
Just as you would expect there to be an enormous difference in expertise between a first year teacher and the 25-year school administrator, my wife and I are very different people than the two that stood before God and over 400 witnesses declaring our love for each other in Bethel AME on December of 1993. The love- the one constant- has been immutable yet at times incredibly tested. Actually it has intensified in a way I can't quantify. We have changed physically-my gray hairs are aggressively vanquishing the black, intellectually, ideologically, and yes spiritually-a quantum leap in maturity and growth. I don't know if you are consistently aware of the modicum of change that each year brings. Certainly we can see and feel the physiological, but the more substantive things like the emotional, spiritual, and worldview follow a different rubric. We have become the enormously proud parents of two incredible adult- well our youngest is 17- daughters and been the beneficiary of the immeasurable joy they have brought into our lives.
We also have become aunts and uncles, nephews, nieces, godparents, play-play parents, administrators, business and home owners, and leaders in a variety of different circles. The years have greatly added...but they have also sadly taken away. This blog is not your normal Hallmarky reminiscing of a union that has been the greatest gift in my life. I just wanted to share in a more incandescent way how two people love imperfectly by the grace of God for 25 years.
