For nearly 16 years of marriage, Super-Spouse has missed out on all the fun.
He missed the hurricane of 2016 that leaked through log walls and downed power for multiple days.
He missed the hurricane two years later that flooded our land and our county and closed schools for can't-sit-still superheroes hopelessly bound to their homes.
He missed the Great Bat Infestation and Simultaneous Basement Flood of 2018 (and all the repairing and re-flooring that followed).
And he missed the 15-minutes-after-arriving-at-the-hospital delivery process of Superhero 2. (Thankfully, thanks to hefty speeding on back roads, Kiersten Slevin, saver of baby deliveries, did NOT 🙌.)
But now that he has changed out of the very last command of his military life (in his pajamas from home in what was an introvert’s dream of a non-ceremony), my favorite superhero who loves to live on other continents when disaster strikes is, for what feels like the first time ever, HOME!
And in a world where we know one deployment or TDY could have easily kept us apart for months, I have never felt so humbled, grateful or blessed.
Quality time together is a luxury in this military life.
Quality time with a man like this one is just plain opulence.
Because not only did this incredible man brave the hardware store and purchase supplies for a month's worth of projects he could execute before stay-at-home orders began, but he used every project as a life lesson for boys who’ve never had such one-on-one time with their dad.
In the last five weeks, he has (in conjunction with little boy assistants by his side) repaired all the walls, replaced all the bulbs and fixed all the because-we-have-boys broken handles and hardware around the house.
He repainted a basement the size of three bedrooms, and he built a shelter for the wood that is always too wet to actually burn in this bonfire-loving life.
He rearranged the furniture and helped the boys plant a garden and even marked, designed and taught the boys how to blaze a running trail that spans .3 miles around our property.
What’s more, he’s dedicated every Saturday to Life Skills Saturday, where he’s taught his children (and his wife!) every skill from ax and knife sharpening to wood chopping to shingling and roofing to last week, compass and land navigation skills. He’s coached our boys on survival skills and water filtration, and he’s taught them how to use a blanket for everything from shelter to warmth in the woods.
On top of that, he’s spent nearly every moment of the last five weeks running and playing and laughing and backyard tent camping with boys who have literally never had their father in this kind of capacity in their lives.
And they, in return, have taken him on a trip to “Southern” Italy, where they wrote, produced and edited a four-minute video of the Redneck version of the dream vacation we had to cancel when Corona rescheduled our soldier’s retirement vacation plans.
(The Polaris-turned-gondola and the “That’s Corona!” song to the tune of “That’s Amore!” sung by mistrals in sweat shorts and suit jackets were my personal faves.)
It’s been the biggest gift and the biggest treasure, and in a season where we don’t know when or if military retirement will happen (medical providers may be asked to delay military retirement in this season of Covid), we feel like God has blessed us with an entire month of even better terminal leave than we would have gotten had we planned it ourselves.
I may be dense, but the insane luxury of having this time and this man are not lost on me.
Super-Spouse, I don’t know what I ever did to deserve you, but I thank God every day that the man I get to wake up beside each morning is the kind of godly, engaged, humble man who makes endless board games in the family room as important as treating patients in the field.
You may not have many words, and this extreme extrovert who has plenty of them but no females in her family to process them with may be consuming them all, but your actions, devotionals and leadership on a daily basis preach loudly.
To our kids.
To me.
We are so blessed by your unswerving, unfailing, consistent behind-the-scenes lavish love, and I have been so blessed to spend an entire Coronacation not just with the man of my dreams but with my very best friend.
The honeymoon with the kids at home may have ended at week four, but I’m so thankful that the one with you never feels like it does.
Happy 42nd birthday, baby.
