Joys are always on their way to us. They are always traveling to us through the darkness of the night. There is never a night when they are not coming. –Amy Carmichael

Sometimes I have to remind myself that there’s a story here, because I’m missing it.

There was a time when I didn’t have to remind myself–instead, I had to pinch myself. It was during those first days of our togetherness, when friendship had given way to something more, and I felt that we were finally, finally what we had been meant to be all along. That we had finally taken the shape that fit. That we had arrived, that I was home. I remember pinching myself in the bagel line and laughing because I’d never had cause to do that before–a dream like this had never come true. I was his girlfriend, but it was more because I knew that one day I’d be his wife. And I’d never known that before. All the years of dating and mismatching and trying so hard to make something fit, they all shifted into place and let out a giant exhale. My life exhaled. Over the next few weeks and months I would feel an occasional inner nudge to appreciate this, these early days of being together, because one day–maybe even soon–I would take it for granted. I would take for granted the fact that we were each other’s and just assume it, would let little things bother me instead of being cute, would get tired of smiling all the time. Even though I knew it would happen, because that’s the way the world works–on a downward slope toward ingratitude–I couldn’t imagine what it would look like.

Now, half a decade later, as we wake up and fall asleep beside each other, as the wear and tear of two lives dependent upon us etches lines into our skin and disruptions into our sleep, I don’t have to imagine what taking us for granted looks like. Because that’s the way the world works–gratitude toward ingratitude. But it’s not the way grace works. Grace reverses the equation. But not without my assent. Not without vigilance. Not without a willingness to see the story, and to tell it. Most of all to myself.

When I’m pushing a double stroller with two boys in it, fifty-plus pounds uphill because, you know, fresh air and change of scenery and strapped in kids and sanity, I’m breathing heavily and I’m wondering when he’ll be home to relieve me and it’s easy for it all–for this life—to be reduced to logistics. For our existence to turn into a list. And then the nudge returns, the years-old nudge, and I remember how it felt to look at each other differently for the first time, for familiarity to give way to rightful affection, how exciting love was. Can be. I tell myself our story again as I push our boys, our life, around the neighborhood. And something changes. Something is made new.

We were lighter then, literally and figuratively. We hadn’t endured sleep deprivation or harsh words or accusing stares, hadn’t spent nights in a hospital with our oldest or made tough decisions or worried simultaneously over the future. We hadn’t organized pick-ups and drop-offs, hadn’t said “You take a shower and I’ll brush his teeth”, hadn’t split up chores or done the grocery shopping. And we hadn’t filed five Christmas cards in a folder, hadn’t amassed boxes marked “Halloween” and “Holidays”, hadn’t collected nicknames and shorthand. We didn’t have two boys who look like each other and both of us, didn’t know what his laugh sounds like or his smile looks like. We didn’t have house-wide stomach viruses but we didn’t have house-wide dance parties, either. We were lighter, but we were less.

And last year, we were preparing for a spinal surgery. We were doing research and making calls. We were getting over the miscarriage and wondering if there would ever be a sibling. We didn’t know that just around the corner there would be victorious walks in a halo but also muscle spasms and pain. We didn’t know the test would read positive and the extra room would be a nursery.

There is always Then and Now and Yet. But somehow, also, there is always all of it at once. The memories and the hopes and the moments, all rolled up into one, because the story never stops being told. There was last year and there is this year and there will be next year and for all the differences between each, there is one common thread, one whisper echoing throughout all of them: grace, making promises that can’t be unkept. Making beauty a constant that never stops. Beauty in yesterday, in today, in the days to come. Advent happening always.