7 years of bliss?

This week was our seventh wedding anniversary, and it reminded me that I haven't blogged lately about being Catholic and married. Logging on just now I realize it has been a year! Time certainly flies, doesn't it?

This past month brought us one of the largest blizzards Chicago has ever seen. I have vague memories of 1979 and the giant walls of snow on either side of the sidewalk, and the excessive sledding we did down every hill around. I wasn't born yet when the 1967 blizzard hit, but it was a consistent reference point for my parents and grandparents every winter when the snow would come. So I knew OF it to be sure.

In addition to being our seventh anniversary, this coming fall will be the tenth anniversary of when Jim and I met. I realize that my life has fallen into a very comfortable groove of being married and having a routine and a pattern for everything we do. It's hard for me to even believe that ten years ago today - my mother was alive, I lived the single life in a high rise downtown, and the thought of ever getting married wasn't even on my radar screen. My husband was dating a teacher and living his own life with no knowledge of me or the life that was in store for him. We were absolutely unaware of what was coming in the next several months.

For me, it was the very sudden loss of my mom and the resulting upheaval of life and emotional chaos. Six weeks later was September 11, 2001. It takes some effort for me to remember that summer. But when I do, I feel the full force of the pain and uncertainty that filled my life. And then came the amazing gift I was given when Jim walked into my life.

I have known for some time now that the summer of 2001 was a sea change for me. Those events changed who I am, and because of that, my heart was opened to the possibilities of love and marriage. If my mother had not died, I would not have likely thought about dating and marriage. I had a comfortable pattern to my life. I worked, traveled, had fun and Life was great. I lacked nothing. I didn't want change. When my mother died, I felt alone for the first time in my life, despite my family around me. Even because of them, actually. They were all married and having families. I was single. Nobody knew where I was in the world or when my flight landed. Nobody wondered if I had made it home from a trip.

When September 11 happened, my roommates parents made her "come home" to Indiana. But I had nowhere to come home to. I can still remember sitting in my high-rise, staring out at the empty streets below. The eerie quiet of the city. Like most companies, we had sent everyone home at work - and the city was all but abandoned. I felt more alone than ever. And I questioned everything from life to death to faith to marriage.

I didn't know that the result of the agonizing day and the soul searching it caused in me would lead me to where I am today. I didn't know that losing my Mom started a chain reaction in my heart that changed the course of my life. But I do know, with absolute certainty, that those two events combined to create a new life for me. Out of death and destruction, my life changed forever.

I met Jim just a few days later. Had it been any other time, I would not have been looking, and I would not have been open to the possibility of falling in love. I would not have met him. And I would not be here today.

When I do think back and remember that summer, I can feel the pain rush back because I remember how troubled my heart was. How lonely and alone I felt. And how lost I was. How my life that had such a wonderful routine and pattern to it, that was filled with happiness and enjoyment, could be so incredibly knocked off track. And the distance of almost a decade makes me smile because I known that my happiness today is so much greater. And that by changing tracks, I changed everything.

Amazing the things that the Lord does in our lives, especially when we cannot see the outcome. We see the pain in front of us in that moment, and we cry out to Lord for help, but we aren't sure if help will come. But it does. It always comes. Sometimes in ways we cannot even imagine.