Marriage is hard.
Even if you’re married to your best friend. Even if you’re married to a good man. Even if you’re married to a godly man.
It’s stll tough.
Marriage is a daily commitment.
Those “I do’s” are nice and all, but the question is, do you still promise when _______________________ happens???
Because that blank will be filled in with all the things you promised on that altar.
The sickness part of “in sickness or in health”? Yep.
The worse part of “for better or worse”? You better believe it.
The poorer part of “for richer or poorer”? For us, without a doubt.
Ultimately, the vows are saying, I see this tidal wave of life coming, and I choose you to stand beside as we face it together.
So, how does that look on a daily basis?
As we approach our twenty-third anniversary, here’s one thing that has made a surprising and remarkable difference in our marriage.
Coffee
Yes, you read that right.
Every evening, for probably 360 days out of the year, Derek and I make a pot of coffee and drink a cup together.
Yep, at bedtime.
No, it doesn’t keep us up. (Exhaustion beats caffeine any day.)
I don’t remember when we started doing this, or why.
I do know that we didn’t sit down and say, let’s enhance our marriage with a cup of coffeee together on a daily basis. What time’s good for you?
It just happened, and it’s improved our relationship.
How?
To quote our pastor, “I’m glad you asked.” 😉
- It makes us stop what we’re doing and focus on each other for a few minutes.
Derek’s good about this, but I tend to do whatever I’m focused on until I literally fall asleep. Grade papers, tweak tomorrow’s notes, Pinterest…
- It sends a message to the kids that this is our time.
Not that we’re like, off limits, if you see a cup of coffee in our hands…but they know this is our time when we’re talking about life, about them, about our day (the things we didn’t share at the dinner table).
- It’s daily.
Once a week doing something special is probably great and all, but we need to connect daily. This is our way.
So, what’s your key to happily ever after? What’s your coffee?
