My wife is making brownies – the smell has reached us in the office, and I’m excited because she makes brownies (and most other baked goods) much better than I do. I don’t know what it is about baking a mixture of milk, eggs, flour, oil, butter, sugar, etc. but I just can’t seem to get the hang of it. I’m thankful I have a wife who loves it and is good at it. She fills that blank in my life.
My Wonderstuffs
Across from me is her desk, where all her craft supplies and scrap booking materials are scattered. There are also colorful petal pushers, jars full of zippers and buttons and string. But all these things are pushed back and in the center of the desk are Thank You cards – she is writing thank you notes to some of our supporters. No matter how strongly I recognize my indebtedness to the people who make this missionary life possible, actually writing thank you notes often slips the mind of this writer. I’m thankful that she remembers how important this is. She fills that blank in my life.
She tells me often of all the structuring and scheduling she is doing for our daughter – how much Katy Jo eats and when, how much she should be eating a month from now (solid foods and mother’s milk), and a month after that, and after that. She talks out loud and throws in a rhetorical “right?” at the end of her sentences; I have learned that it is not my opinion she is seeking, but simply an affirmation that – “Yes, that’s exactly right.” And she is right. She does so much planning and concerning herself with our future, which is great because not only do I not consider the future very often, but I can hardly be found in the present or the past either. Most of the time I’m somewhere else entirely make-believe. I’m thankful she shoulders a double load of concerns for the little things that have to be thought out. She fills that blank in my life.
She sometimes takes hold of my shoulders or my face to make sure I am looking at her, and she asks me if I know how much she loves me. I say that I do, but truthfully, I don’t think I have more than a vague idea. She loves me so much more than I know, and while I could say the same thing about her, it is not my love for her that amazes me, but her love for me. It is this love that carries her through those moments when I am utterly infuriating, and this love that bears forth so effortlessly day after day. I am thankful that she loves me, because, if she didn’t, I really wonder if I’d actually be the person I am at all. She fills that blank in my life.
