Fireproofing

Omar and I have been taking a marriage course at church. We are on week 4 and it is such an interesting experience. See, marriage is like making a pizza. Except, in that context, we have never seen anyone successfully make a pizza. We were raised around pizzas that had way too many anchovies and were burnt and then fell splat on the floor. So, weve carefully navigated through this marriage thing for the last year and half, feeling much like Columbus, having no idea what we are doing, and we're finally discovering America. Except, unlike Columbus, we've realized that somebody has already discovered America, so rather than trying to do everything our own way and screwing up the entire new world, we are following their lead, surrounding ourselves with people who have already lived well in this place. Can you tell i've been teaching world history? Anyway, rather than commiting mass genocide, we are taking the smart road and have realized that maybe we arent the first people in the world that have ever tried to be married. The day we realized that was a turning point in our relationship, so we signed up for a marriage course.

If you've ever seen the movie Fireproof, you know what I mean when I say that we are fireproofing our marriage. Even though it is heaven on earth right now, someday we will face challenges and we are learning now how to overcome them. Together.

In the last few weeks, we've focused on how we talk to eachother. For instance, a few weeks ago I cleaned the bathroom. It was an epic event, and if we knew where to find our camera I would have posted pictures. I'm smack in the middle of The Semester From Hell, and anything I do beyond homework deserves to be scrapbooked. The day I cleaned the bathroom I did it in ten minutes, between classes. A few days later, Omar and I were in the kitchen and our conversation went a little something like this:

Omar: You really need to learn how to clean toilets.
Me: fsdfjasiouf832334#%$@#%@!!!

Now, were learning how to communicate more lovingly, so the next time he confronted me with an issue about housework, it was done in a way that made me swoon.
I have been addicted to this delicious "food" for the last week or so:

It is a chocolatey, delicious, FAST, breakfast and it resulted in 4 glasses with chocolate bottoms side by side on the clean, bathroom counter next to my make-up bag. Omar saw this, and what had the potential to be World War IV in our house, became this:

(This is a beautiful cup collection. It would look better in the kitchen! I Love You!)

and a giggly wife who was more than happy to do this:

“I love being married. It's so great to find that one special person you want to annoy for the rest of your life.” -Rita Rudner

I have a secret, that is not really a secret

My best friends know this well. My family finds it amusing. Acquaintances have absolutely no idea. It is a thorn in my flesh/ immense blessing that has changed the entire course of my life, how I view human beings, and how I see myself. It is not a closet obsession with The Secret Life of the American Teenager, although that is true too.....

Its just that in the deepest parts of my soul, I find immense love and purpose in people with disabilities.

I didnt always feel this way. In fact, when I was in high school I did this ridiculous segment on the morning news called "Joke Time." Broadcasted to the entire school, my friends and I told jokes about whatever was relevant. They were usually incredibly clever, like "What do you call a seagull that flies over the bay? A BAYGULL!" I know. I have a gift. Dont be surprised if you see me on Saturday Night Live.

Anyway, once I told an incredibly offensive joke about "retards" and had to apologize on air after it got a very negative reaction from most of my teachers. My face turned bright red when I walked into my math class and my teacher reprimanded me in front of the entire class, and spent the next half hour lecturing us on the value that people with mental disabilities have to the people that love them and how much it hurts when other people make fun of them just because they have a disability.

Fast forward 6 years. I have been teaching kids with autism, downs syndrome, and mental retardation for two years. I had a God-breathed epiphany one summer which changed my mentality about people with disabilities from eh, ho hum, dont really care, to OH. MY. GOSH. I WANT TO SPEND THE REST OF MY LIFE ADVOCATING FOR AND LOVING ON KIDS WITH DISABILITIES. I WANT THEM, AND EVERYONE ELSE, TO KNOW THAT THEY ARE MADE IN THE IMAGE OF GOD AND THAT THEY ARE VALUABLE, INCREDIBLE HUMAN BEINGS.

I have another year before I will have my degree in Special Education, but I spent the entire year last year teaching in a self-contained Autism classroom. Now, I am co-teaching a class of kids with a variety of special needs, and I can honestly say that I have never enjoyed anything more. Really. There is a student in my class named C. He has autism, which in his case means that he has "abnormal" social skills even though he "looks like every other kid," whatever that means. He also astonishes me on a daily basis with the things that come out of his mouth. For example:

Me (asking about another teacher): Does she believe in God?
Mrs. S: Yes.
C (not even looking away from his computer, but with a huge sigh of relief): Phew! Good Thing!
Me: What do you mean?
C: I think God would be pretty upset if she didnt believe in Him!

Me (after a discussion on friendship and love): So, who do you guys love?
"Fuzzy": High School Musical 3!
M: My dog
E: My friends and family
C: Everybody. Everybody in the whole world.
Me: C, why do you love everybody?
C: Because everybody is a child of God, and He made them.
L: Thats so dumb.
C: IT IS NOT DUMB. ITS THE TRUTH. THE TRUTH IS NOT DUMB.

Something equally adorable/convicting happens every few minutes in my day, and man, oh, man, how did I get so lucky?

A tribute to Bob

Once there was man who made some very bad decisions, and ended up homeless and addicted to hard drugs. He was desperate for a job and a home, so he applied to work at an apartment complex. There, he was able to earn a little bit of money holding a sign out in front of the apartments to draw people in. A few months later, the apartment complex discovered that they could no longer afford to employ him, so they decided to lay him off.

That day, he came in from his long day of sign holding, and asked to play the piano that was on display in the apartment's clubhouse. The apartment manager agreed, and went into her office, trying to figure out the best way to fire the man. Moments later, tears streamed down her face, and she sat in awe at the sound that filled her ears. She asked the man how long he had been playing piano, and he told her that he had been trained his entire life, that it was his deepest passion. With tear filled eyes, she asked him to come into her office. Then, she told him that she could no longer afford to keep him as a sign holder.....but she would love for him to be their new property maintenance man, as long as he played piano whenever she asked.

A few days later my mother in law walked into the managers office to sort things out with my brother in laws apartment. The man was playing piano, and my mother in law was in shock at his ability. She promised my husband that she would pay for music lessons a few months ago, but we hadn't found a teacher yet. So, she asked if he knew music theory well enough to teach my musical husband. He said that he most definitely did, and would only be willing to teach him if he was willing to learn music theory, not just how to play Twinkle Twinkle Little Star.

A few minutes ago, I met Bob for the first time. He is sitting in my husband's music room, carefully instructing him on D minor. He has a bright smile, and looks almost exactly how I pictured him. He and Omar have been speaking in musical tongues for several hours now, and Omar responds to him with the reverence that a young apprentice would have towards a musical genius. Which he is. I have never heard more beautiful music in my life. I have spent only minutes with Bob, and I am able to see the resilience in his eyes. It is clear that he is passionate, and patient, and grateful for the opportunity to be here. Moments ago, when I handed him his $1.00 frozen pizza that he heated up in our oven, and asked if they needed anything else, he replied, "Cheap pizza and bottled water, what else could ya possibly need?"



To Bob, the homeless musical prodigy, thank you.

Celebrating life

I have been to more than 20 funerals in my 23 years of life. I have witnessed the aftermaths of the death of friends that I have loved dearly, a father who I never had the chance to meet, all of my grandparents, kids under the age of 18 who had so much life ahead of them, and almost every pet ive ever had. People who know me well, know that I speak of death oftentimes in a way that is morbidly candid. I have been there. I have felt the anguish of losing someone too soon. I have seen young bodies in caskets and obsessed over the idea that this isnt the way it is supposed to be.

Because it isnt.

And I have seen the effects of these tragedies on other people too. The countless myspace blogs, the letters, the tears, the days on end that are devoted to the memory of lost loved ones, the high school students who cant get through the day because the wound is so fresh. I have seen shattered hearts, as people try to pick up the pieces, and innumerable license plate frames and stickers, "in loving memory of...."

Death is powerful and tragic and unpredictable, and yet...so expected. We live in fragile, temporary, bodies, and someday we will all die. And it always hurts the people around us, and it is always tragic. Its funny how we take it though, its as if it isnt supposed to happen, and when it does, we panic. We pour our entire beings into honoring the dead. Scraps of paper become mementos and we wallow in the sorrow that comes with losing a loved one. The most common statement ive heard is "If I had only had more time." If we had more time with them, we would tell them this, or give them that, or apologize for this.

And yet, there are so many others around us that we take for granted, people we still have time with. People whose phone calls we forget to return. People whose emails we ignore and who we break plans with. We forgot how temporary we are, until someone dies and we freak out and overcompensate, and frankly, it breaks my heart.

What if we actually celebrated life? What if we celebrated the people around us and spent more time loving eachother and less time criticizing one another? What if, even for one day a year, we thanked God for one another, for allowing us to be alive and on earth for one more year? And what if, when our eyes filled with tears at funerals, it wasnt because we hadnt loved them well? What if you could look at the people around you and say, "If that person died tomorrow I would know in the deepest parts of my heart that I loved them well, spent quality time with them, served them wholly, and, man, I cant wait to see them in heaven?" What would the world look like if we loved eachother deliberately? What if we did this in loving memory of every person we've ever known?

You matter to me. And more importantly, you matter to God. From the moment of conception, and well after death, into all of eternity, every soul is valuable and worth it to Him.
And ultimately, the best way to love Him is to love eachother.
In honor of humans, I am going to write tributes to ordinary heroes, people, dead and alive, who have touched my life in an extraordinary way and would otherwise go unnoticed. I hope you will do the same. Lets celebrate life together.

a quarter of a century ago...

A quarter of a century ago, he was born. And, in a way, I was born too, because every moment of his life for the last 25 years, is now a part of me. Because he is a part of me. And I had no idea how to tell him how grateful I am for that, so his 24 closest friends and family members and I wrote him letters. And I put them in a book. And I gave it to him for his birthday. And his eyes teared up when he realized how significant his life has been for so many people. And it has. No other person has touched my life the way he has.

My handsome husband,

Your lifesong- the melody to which your soul dances and your feet tap along to the beat. Twenty-five days after you were conceived a rhythm began in the tiny chambers of your chest, a flutter, but a song nonetheless. Long before your heart began to beat inside your mother’s womb, the Great Composer compiled the opus that would be your life, a carefully chosen chorus of people that would be your accompaniment, and the great things you would do to serenade the world. Your gifts are bountiful and you have been blessed with an indomitable spirit and a smile that could bring peace to a hundred year war. Your life sings a song of redemption and as you continue to allow love to prevail the gospel will be preached through your life even more clearly. You are, by far, the most intelligent and captivating human being I have ever known. When God speaks through you, the world is hypnotized. You’ve chosen to play your song in the key of He who has started a good work in you, and will not relinquish until you have taken your last breath. My prayer is that you will continue to have a faith that can move mountains, and that you will continue to face trials with resilience and motivation to travel deeper into the rabbit hole. I could not possibly feel more blessed to know you, to be chosen by God to be the other half to your duet. You serenaded me with your quick wit and single dimple, and the organ that was rapidly beating out of your chest that echoed the timpanies in my own heart. You stole me in a single moment, the only man who has ever tethered my unruly heart. How did I get so lucky to be chosen to be your wife? I thank God everyday for letting me be a part of your journey. 25 years from now, your 50^th birthday letter will look very different. I’ll probably talk about how you have been the most wonderful father in the world to our many children and how I’ve loved touring the world with you and seeing lives be transformed by your music and your life. But mostly I will say that you have become the person that you set out to become; the encouraging, faithful, constant, middle-aged man who is known solely by his love for God and love for people. You’ve come so far already, my love, I cant wait to see where this life takes us. Thank you for being such an adventurous, patient, skillful, high-spirited, authentic, candid, man of God… your lifesong sings in perfect harmony with the world that you were created to change. I can’t wait to see the many amazing things that God does with your life.

Happy 25^th birthday Babas! I love you.

Epilogue

Being married to the love of your life is not like dancing on clouds, or running across the milky way galaxy, in fact, I have no idea what to compare it to, because it is incomparable. The beginning, the literal honeymoon period is like heaven on earth:

Chillin on the beach with my sweet huz

chillin on a boat with my sweet huz

chillin at a waterfall with my sweet huz

chillin before parasailin with my sweet huz

chillin at sunset on the ocean with my sweet huz

We had the perfect honeymoon. And we had the perfect first few months of marriage, because we still believed that we could do no wrong. We stayed in bed all day on Saturdays and laughed when people said that the first year was the hardest. And then it was. And six months into our marriage I freaked out. I suddenly realized that I was tied to one person for the rest of my life and he was not at all the same person that I started dating. That person bought me flowers all the time and wrote me love notes and laughed at everything I said. This new person in my bed was so different; he farted all the time and we argued over who would do the dishes in our sink. At that point, if our commitment was to eachother and not to God, we would have failed. I would have run away from the situation, like ive done in so many others, and he would have drowned himself in some substance or another. Because God was working in our lives though, He taught us how to treat eachother with love and respect. He renewed our love for eachother, and made us see eachother through different eyes. See, I don't think that you can love a person until you can see them inside and out. Until youve seen them at their weakest, most unimpressive state. Until youve woken up next to bad breath and tried to go to the bathroom in the night only to find that they forgot to flush. Once youve seen all of that, and can still say that they are the most lovable human being on the planet, then you can have an accurate perception of where your life together will go. Until then, its only small talk.

Omar and I are learning to love eachother unconditionally, and in situations where other relationships would fail, we flourish. Weve chosen to be gentle with eachother's hearts, accepting of eachother's faults, and willing to work to change the parts of ourselves that are taking away from the whole of our relationship. We have gone from the deep infatuation of our engagement, to a lifelong commitment, centered around our authentic love for eachother and for God.

I wrote this in January of 2007, and its more true now than ever:

in song of soloman the beloved (the woman) urges her friends three times to "not arouse or awaken love until it so desires" and i completely understand why she is so persistent about it. all i want to do is tell all of the people around me in my loudest, boldest voice to WAIT FOR THIS, wait for the plan that God has for you, DONT WASTE YOUR TIME on anything else, it will come when both hearts have been prepared. and it is SO worth waiting for. but i know that this is one of those things that you have to figure out on your own, and when you do you'll want to shout it to everyone and no one will listen because they are still figuring it out on their own. conundrum.

To the many sweet souls who took time out of your lives to read this: Thank you.

Chapter 16: You and I were made to worship

I wrote this the day after we got engaged: I always thought that my dream to dance on clouds was literal, but i know now that i was wrong. Dancing on clouds is actually the feeling you get when you know that youre going to spend the rest of your life with the most incredible person you've ever met.

If that is true, then knowing that in a few hours you are going to promise your life away to that same person is like running barefoot across the milky way galaxy.

We had several interesting situations that made the day a little chaotic:
The first was during breakfast with my bridesmaids when we discovered that the slideshow DVD that one of my sweet friends spent 3 days on, was not actually the slideshow DVD. It was actually something totally scandalous that belonged to my brother in law and that would not be the best choice of wedding entertainment. In fact, I think we couldve gotten sued for showing it. Since almost everyone coming to our wedding had already taken the five hour journey from Vegas to San Diego, we called everyone we knew that was coming to the wedding. Our wonderful friends, Tracy and Jose, were already at stateline, but turned around and followed our instructions to break into Jill's house to ge the laptop the dvd was made on. Problem solved.

In addition, After Hours tux shop is not for the faint at heart, particularly not for the bride who wanted NO black outfits at her wedding, particularly in her bridal party. You know, the bride who picked out champagne colored tuxes with light salmon vests and ties just to stay away from the traditional black tux wedding. After Hours apparently didnt get the memo that I didnt want my gay-exboyfriend-groomsman to look like he was the groom in all of my pictures. So, fifteen minutes before the ceremony began, Jon came upstairs quite apprehensively. When I saw him I had my single bridezilla moment that obviously consisted of calmly telling Jon that it didnt matter what color tux he wore (or lecturing the sweet lady on the phone at After Hours for five minutes straight about how they, oh my gosh, totally ruined my entire wedding). Apparently, at some point I got over it because when Omar sent the message that his dad, who had flown here all the way from Venezuela for our wedding, had gotten lost and had not arrived yet, I was calm and collected.
So, we waited the extra half hour for him to find his way, and in spite of these few mishaps, the best day of my entire 21 years of existence began:

The Entrance

My precious bridesmaids, using teamwork to tie up my dress. It didnt take nearly as long to be taken off. Did I just say that?

These sweet girls do this with me quite often, this time was particularly special.

Our wonderful photographer, Bobbie, thought that this group of strapping young men crying and praying together was one of the most touching things she's ever seen. I agree.

My best friend, Jessica.

My (step) dad, who has walked along side me for every important moment in the last 14 years.

He has the most tender heart out of anyone I know. Don't tell him I told you that.

Everything we ever dreamed of.

"Building a marriage is alot like building a house...." -Pastor David, in reference to the houses in Mexico that my BFFS and I built together.

One of my favorite parts of the ceremony, Pastor David brought the pink, sparkly, hammers that we blistered our hands and built memories in our hearts with.

"A cord of three strands is not quickly broken..."

"Allie, I love you with all of my heart. You are my soulmate and my companion. I remember exactly one year ago today when we started our journey together. I knew on that day that we were meant to be together to share Christ's love with the world. I pledge my all to you just as Christ gave His life for the church. In sickness, I will nurse you back to health. In health, I will encourage you on your path. In sadness, I will help you to remember. In happiness, I will be there to make memories with you. In poverty, I will do all that I can to make our love rich. And in wealth, I will never let our love grow poor. Nothing can, or ever will, change the unconditional love that I have for you. Til death do us part."

I take you Babas, to be my husband, my best friend, my soulmate, and my partner in life.. You have shown me what it means to love, to forgive, and to endure, and more than that you have given me a walking example of God’s incredible love. You have nurtured me, sacrificed for me, protected me, and provided for me. I promise to give you every part of my heart that belongs in human hands. I promise to always be faithful to you and deserving of your trust. I promise to laugh with you and cry with you and to offer you words of hope and life. I know that our love is a gift from God, and I promise to treat it as that, and to love you with all that I am for the rest of my life.

Big ol' kiss the bride smoocheroo!

Real, authentic, I hope no one is watching, Ohmygosh we just got married, smoocheroo!


Little sister Olivia, BFF Jon, Brotherinlaw Omar, BFF Whitney, Our friend Austin, BFF Jess, Cheesy smoochey newlyweds, BFF Allyson, Omar's BFF Tyler, Younglife friend Katie, Younglife friend Mark
Almost all of these guys have single-handedly held me up at different times in my life, so thankful they still do.

Man, he is a hunk.
My beautiful girls, with their sparkling smiles and change-the-world hearts.

Our fam.

Sweet sweet, July 29th sunset on the beach kisses.

Love my sweet bridesmaids, dontcha know?

The redeemed slideshow, and delicious sushi bar.

The night before the wedding, we choreographed this dance in a conference room at the hotel, it was evident.

It had to be you, it had to be you
I wandered around, and finally found
The somebody who- could make me be true
Could make me be blue or even be glad
Just to be sad just thinking of you
Some others I've seen might never be mean
Might never be cross or try to be boss
But they wouldn't do
For nobody else gave me the thrill
With all your faults I love you still
It had to be you, Wonderful you, It had to be you!

Sweet dad, always stepping in, without stepping on my feet.

The best overpriced cake in the world. Our little friends were a tad anxious.

Austin Byrd, the giant wrestler that introduced me to the concept of God, caught the bouquet...of course.

Omar's sick awesome dance moves are CLEARLY genetic.

Our wedding was the epitome of my perfect fantasy. God's evident love shined brighter through my groom that day more than ever and kissing him at the alter was just like that moment in Never Been Kissed where Drew Barrymore realizes that she is kissing the last person she will ever kiss in her life, but better because it was real, and because our fickled, wayward, hearts had found a home in eachother for all of eternity.

And they lived happily ever after....


Stay tuned for the "Epilogue"