The Ring. The Marriage.

Yesterday, as I carried my 5 month old baby on my hip, her very favorite place to be, she spit up all over my hand. As this is a very common occurrence, I didn’t think much of it as the spit up rolled down the back of my hand and covered my wedding ring. However, as I stuck my hand under the running water to rinse the muck away the gears of thought and memory began to turn. When my husband, Matt, first presented me with this ring it was perfect and pristine. A fabulous piece of jewelry, it’s luster at it’s peak and it’s sparkle fantastic. The same can be said of our relationship. New, exciting. A pristine beginning with endless potential.
In the beginning, when the ring was new it was easy to keep it’s sparkle. My hands were clean most the day and I remembered to clean it often. In the beginning a marriage is easy to maintain. There is little to taint it, to challenge it.
Now, three children and seven and a half years later my ring has lost a lot of its shine, its sparkle slightly dulled, different. It is marked and nicked. I hardly remember to clean it. My hands are often involved in messy things like cooking, cleaning, baby bodily fluids, etc. There are so many layers of life on this ring now. In turn, there are so many layers of life on our marriage. We have met challenges and prevailed. We have been nicked and dinged a few times. The sparkle is different, but still beautiful.
But like my ring, which is more beautiful to me than ever before, so is our marriage. It is the layers of life, the dirt and grime, that make life mean something. A new ring is nice, but it doesn’t mean much until it has been worn and becomes a part of your finger. Marriage is better the longer we wear it, the longer we make it fit and make it part of us. As we work together, things may change, things may be hard, but the essential luster can never be lost. And when we look at it it becomes more, becomes great, despite its flaws. The beauty of the ring and of the marriage now comes from what it means.