One might suppose that after being married for 31 years and counting that I would know what my wife likes and dislikes. Yet, sitting with her at the breakfast table the other morning I discovered another thing to add to the list of things she doesn’t like. Upon learning this, I also realized how how our marriage mirrors our life. In life, somewhere along the way, we come to grasp the fact that we will never know everything and that everyday there is something we will learn that we didn’t know the day before. Be it a bit of trivial information, or an important detail to help complete the project of the day. Learning in life really has no planned itinerary unless we are studying specifically for a class or searching for a particular answer to a problem of which we are seeking a solution. After a while we may cease to think about it, our increasing knowledge,happening at all, but we will keep advancing our knowledge even while being blissfully ignorant of our doing so.

So, with that understanding, I think I had forgotten that with each new day of married life, I would continue to learn about my wife whether or not I was alert enough to realize it. I had progressed to the point that the only time I did become aware that I just learned something new about my wife, was when it became perhaps a less than astounding but more than the trivial run of the mill, ho-hum daily grind kind of stuff. If you don’t understand, well, you either have never been in a long, close relationship, like marriage, or, like me, you hadn’t taken the time to realize what you had been missing. Either way, there is hope if you follow my lead and repent now.

So, my marriage is like my life: each day is a new day to be lived and enjoyed. And from each day we can learn something if we pay the price of attention. And like life itself, some days married will be better enjoyed than others; some days will end, gratefully, with us still standing; and some days will just be another day that keeps us wondering what kind of day it really was. But all of them are found to be worth living and learning from as they form the basis for the days yet lived. 

And what did I learn at the breakfast table? My wife doesn’t like oatmeal with peaches and cream.