one long, beautiful year

jon & i celebrated our 1st wedding anniversary yesterday with a 60-mile bike ride east. this, after a 60-mile bike ride west the previous day. okay, so maybe 120 miles was a little overambitious for someone like me who had biked twice before the trip. and, yes, maybe i did break down and cry twice, once at the 40-mile mark the first day, and again at the 5,6, and 7 mile markers the following day. and maybe my butt, elbows, and knees are still sore and aching for yet another dose of advil. but it was a beautiful ride. i felt like an athletic, harder core version of anne of green gables. i loved it. that bike ride put the perfect ending on the first chapter of our marriage.

of course, one hundred and twenty miles takes some time to bike, so we had plenty to opportunity to talk about all sorts of things, not the least of which was discussing some of the most important things we’ve learned this year from each other. highlights include:

• i’ve got this incredible ability to run smack into mental blocks and refuse to move beyond them; jon’s got this crazy talent of getting me over those hurdles (namely, repelling down 175-foot waterfalls, canoeing & backpacking in the boundary waters in early spring, swimming through open-air tunnels in the caribbean sea, cross-country skiing for the first time in the dark with only a head lamp and the moon to light the way).
• i get emotionally attached to nearly every idea i’ve ever heard – even if i disown it 5 minutes later, i love it fully for those 5 minutes. and jon has learned to let me have that time, and not to even try and logically disuade me from paying any attention to a bad idea. i get there eventually. it’s better for us when i have 5 minutes to determine whether the idea is worth my love or not. and i’ve learned that jon’s usually right about my ideas from the beginning.
• i love snuggling more than any other human being on the planet; jon believes there are people on the planet that love cuddling more than he does. we’ve learned that marriage is better for us when we snuggle.
• i wrestle with everything. and when i wrestle, i take on the whole sha-bang of whatever it is. jon wrestles with a lot, but he does it piece-by-piece. it’s a really good mix and makes for healthy dialogue between the two of us.
• our friendship is by far one of the very best aspects of our marriage. there is no other person that i respect as deeply or trust as completely as jon.

i love learning with him. putting into practice things we’d heard we’d have to do is finally reality. it sounds dumb, but i’ve finally discovered that he really can’t read my mind; i have to tell him that the best way to end the argument is with a hug. and he’s learned that when i tell him he can read in bed for awhile, i actually mean that he can read as long as i’m reading, but when i’m done, we’re done. in turn, i’ve learned that i have to be way less selfish. dang that kooky dr. emerson and his crazy cycle for being right after all!

in all, from our honeymoon in banff and our trip to honduras to debating where pictures should hang in our house and hosting monthly forums in our house, this has been one full & wonderful year. even if it started off with a broken foot and ended with a sore, aching butt, i really couldn’t have imagined marriage would be this dang beautiful .