Aggressive pigs and geese, and ... a love letter to Mike.

Mike just informed me that he'd found an ad for not one but three potbellied pigs who are (and I quote) "aggressive to other animals and people". 😅 Exciting news indeed! James (of the James and Helen gentlest of all geese breeds duo 😏) has begun hissing angrily every time we come within thirty feet of him. (He even bit my--luckily gloved--hand when I was trying to feed the ungrateful brute the other night.) These pigs would make the perfect addition to the farm of utter terror we are developing.

He was teasing me of course--about the aggressive potbellies, not about pigs in general. I had mentioned, as I snuggled up close to him in bed the other night and looked over his shoulder at a screen full of various pigs for sale, that it was unfortunate that the only animal I'd ever told him I really did not even remotely want to have ... had become the sole animal of his interest.

"But they're so cute as piglets," he responded in defense.

There was no arguing that. "Yes," I said. "They are cute as piglets." (But my tone carried all Mike already knows about my feelings for adult pigs. [Who, at least from behind, look for all the world as though they should put some clothes on! 😄Also, whatever you do, do not google anything like "pig eats man". You will not like it. And your home will become like ours--one where nobody can even talk about pigs without one of their kids mentioning how they will most likely eat us before we eat them.])

For all of that, Mike's interest in having our kids show pigs at the fair has not waned. 

What am I to do with such a husband? What I ask you?

I do not know. But speaking of that particular husband. Look what I came across the other day:

This was at a Thanksgiving Turkey Trot the month before we were married. (The following year would find me running that same race--nearly nine months pregnant with Abe and hoping, in vain, that the race might put me in labor. 😄)

But look how young we were. Sometimes I don't feel like we've aged so very much since those early days together, but we are more than twice as old (!) as we were in that photo! I just keep looking at it. And feeling ... I don't even know what exactly. So happy I have Mike, I guess? It's all a bunch of mixed feelings of gratitude, nostalgia, a little missing, awe over all that's been. In any case, whatever it is, indulge me for just a minute in simply trying to tell how I feel about Mike. My great grandkids might read this someday after all. Perhaps they'll want to know how their great-grandma Nancy felt about that pig-shopping husband of hers.

So I will try and tell you:

Every now and then (more often than you might suppose), it feels like the depth of my feelings for Mike are going to explode out of me. And they do! More than any other blessing in my life, it is the gift of Mike that has me, with almost no conscious thought, exclaiming my gratitude up to the heavens. Sort of like when you have a newborn and you are just uttering little prayers of awe and thanks all day long. My soul just can't not send those thanks up to God constantly over having my Mike. Every time I snuggle into him before falling asleep at night. Every time I'm out running and have a little quiet to reflect. I just feel so grateful to have him. I tell Mike often how much I love him, but I do not think even he truly knows how much or how often I think about him. I truly long to be near him all of the time. I can hardly pass him in the kitchen or hall without hugging him tightly to me for a minute. I even find myself looking forward to things like Sunday School simply because I can just sit close to him uninterrupted for an hour! I can't explain how much just being physically close to him is a joy and a comfort to me. (I can't tell you how many times just being next to him has been enough to soothe major anxieties and worries.) I don't just miss him when he's away from me, I feel a dull ache in my chest when I know I can't be near him. And if we are ever remotely feeling distant or at odds with one another, I feel utterly wretched and miserable. I have been thinking lately that if all of the struggles of earth life--the tests and trials, and all the efforts to consecrate and sacrifice and serve to keep my covenants with God ... if the only blessing they resulted in was my getting to be with Mike forever, that would be enough. That would make all of this worth it. I genuinely feel that I have no greater blessing in my life. If I were to die, Mike could marry again. In truth I wouldn't want him to be lonesome. (Though I do actually pray often that, if possible, Mike and I will not have to spend very much time away from each other through death!) But also ... I hope he would know (he would know) that he would still be mine. Completely and fully. I relinquish no claim to him ever. He is as much a part of me as my very own soul is. There is something more than just love there. I don't know what it is. But it isn't just poetry. It's something real about how tied I am to him in my very core. I love him so much. I don't know that there is any single thing that I feel more intensely or more strongly than my tie to and love for him. And there is nothing that gives me more comfort than knowing that he really truly will be mine forever--that we are tied in some way that death honestly cannot break, that I never ever ever have to truly be separated from him. I never want to be. There is nothing I want more than just ... being with Mike always. I feel like I just want to keep saying, "I love him. I love him. I love him." And it still can't express it enough. But I don't want to put these words out--to proclaim this truth--only in some future day when one of us has passed on and these words might seem like just the sayings of someone looking back through rose colored glasses. I want to say them clearly now, while we are in the thick of mortality and our own weaknesses and failings and tiredness and worries and stresses and daily demands. This is how I feel for him right now. In the midst of all of it. And I'll stop there. (Though I suppose, after all of that, I can add that ... if he needs a few pigs that's probably ok. So long as they don't eat us.😄)