Thirty Reasons I Love My Husband

August 29, 1981

1.  I love that in your glance I feel chosen by you once again.

2.  I love the silence of our affection; that across a crowded room we can share a joke or a smile.

3.  I love that in your eyes our daughters can see reflected there the depth of man they want to marry.

4.  I love that I am a better “me” with you than I would have been without you.

5.  I love that in your heart I am always beautiful.

6.  I love that your shoulders are wide enough to carry the responsibility of caring for our family, yet your knees know where to go when the load is too great.

7.  I love that in the night’s stillness I can reach out and find you beside me.

8.  I love that you have left big footprints for our sons to follow.

9.  I love holding hands with you.

10.  I love that there is this neon sign above your head that flashes, “I am a pastor. I care about you” and complete strangers will pour out their life stories to you. (A little awkward when we’re at a restaurant or movie, but...)

11.  I love that you are an off-the-chart extrovert (HOW many Facebook friends?). Watching you interact with people is amazing.

12.  I love your sense of adventure, and how you never get lost. (Tolkien’s phrase, “All who wander are not lost” was written for you.)

13.  I love how I fit perfectly under your arm.

14.  I love listening to you preach and sometimes, when I should be listening to stories in Genesis or Luke, I can’t help thinking, “Wow!  I’m married to this man!”

15.  I love listening to the pride you have in our city. In our community of faith. In our family.

16.  I love that we both love hiking. This hobby has taken us to Camelback Mountain, the Grand Canyon, the Havasupai, New Zealand and soon Machu Picchu.

17.  I love knowing that God has brought us together.

18.  I love the boy that has never grown up. (Sharpie Wars, anyone? Soda Crackers flung like ninja stars? Wrestling matches?)

19.  I love that you have shared life with me when we have walked through some of the hardest things imaginable.

20.  I love how you come up behind me in the kitchen and kiss my neck and then make coffee and “get in my way.”

21.  I love how you encourage my dreams. (My trip to Norway with my family. My writing.)

22.  I love how you ask the kids at the dinner table, “What do I want to know aboutyour day?” and then listen to their answers and sometimes say, “I don’t want to know that,” and make them dig deeper.

23.  I love when your brain works faster than your mouth so you make up new words in the English language. I love how the kids find this vastly entertaining during your sermons.

24.  I love the laugh lines on your face and knowing I can trust you to care for me even when we are both gray and wrinkled. (Wait a minute, we are both gray and wrinkled!)

25. I love that you don’t mind my scars.

26. I love witnessing the favor and respect that others have for you as a city councilmember.

27. I love how you take time to read every week to children at Galveston Elementary school.

28. I love that I am now married to a grandfather.

29. I love that I have fallen in love more than a thousand times, and it’s always been with you.

30. I love the memories of 30 years with you.

I LOVE YOU!