After I Do

It’s a lesson learned by those who have faced the most miserable of tragedies, and it’s a secret that I suspect you yourself already know: the sun will always rise. Always.
The sun rises the next day after mothers lose their babies, after men lose their wives, after countries lose wars. The sun will rise no matter what pain we encounter. No matter how much we believe the world to be over, the sun will rise. So you can’t go around assessing love by whether or not the sun rises. The sun doesn’t care about love. It just cares about rising.

Do you want to be there for the last moments of one life or the first moments of another? Do you honor the past or ring in the future?

He’s so gentle about it, so loving, that I wonder how I was able to wipe away my own tears all these past months. In an instant, I have forgotten how to live without him, now that he is here.

He runs toward me and picks me up, grabbing me, clutching me.
“I love you,” he says. He has started to cry. “I love you, Lauren, I love you so much. I’ve missed you. God, I’ve missed you.”
My face hasn’t changed. I’m still stunned. My arms are wrapped around him. My legs are wrapped around him. He puts me down and kisses me. When his lips touch mine, my heart burns. It’s like someone lit a match in my chest.
How did he know I needed him? How did he know to find me?

It’s Ryan. It’s always been Ryan. Just because I can live without him doesn’t mean I want to.

I often think of my grandmother as the old lady at the dinner table. But she’s seen generations. She was a child once. She was a teenager. A newlywed. A mother. A widow.

Why do we do this? Why do we undervalue things when we have them? Why is it only on the verge of losing something that we see how much we need it?

But I just miss you right now. I just want you near me. You bring out the best in me. And I could use the best of me right now.
I love you.

This kind of stuff is why I married you. I married you because you take care of me. Because you make things seem OK when they aren’t OK. Because you believe in me. You know I can handle things even when I feel like I won’t make it through.

And it made me miss you. Not you, my wife. Or you, the woman who has been with me since I was nineteen years old. You. Lauren Maureen Spencer Cooper. I missed you.

And it wasn’t a passing feeling. It was real. I truly felt there was a hole in my life and the only thing that could fill it was you.

I think this is working, Lauren. I think we’re gonna be OK.