Weekend Plans

For some reason, Heather and I have been doing a lot of reminiscing about our dating years lately.  I'm sure everyone feels like their courtship with their spouse was uniquely special in wonderful ways that are difficult to explain to those who did not experience them first hand.  But ours really was.  Our story from that time in life includes all the elements of a classic love story: an early love triangle, long odds, a brief breakup, a long separation, and a joyous reunion.

Our first year (before we served our missions) set a foundation for our relationship that has proven to be exceptionally strong.  For my part, the love triangle and long odds I mentioned above motivated me to work really, really hard every single day to win the affection of this special lady.  While I can't hoestly say that I still maintain that level of constant effort in our current quotidian life, to this day I still frequently find myself thinking I need to reaffirm to her how much she means to me in words and deeds.

The culmination of all of that effort was our long-awaited wedding in August of 2000.  It's not often that I feel like I receive (and can recognize) specific promises from a higher power.  But early in our relationship I felt a steady sense of peace that this thing could really work.  So for me our wedding was not only my chance to marry the girl of my dreams, but also the realization of intense faith, effort, and promises that was years in the making.

Heather and I were fortunate enough to get married in the Boise, Idaho LDS temple.  Readers who have not attended an LDS temple wedding should know that this ceremony involves the making of sacred covenants (a similar idea to traditional marriage vows) and it takes place in a beautiful room surrounded by close friends and family members.  It's a lovely ceremony that touches on not only issues of Earthly importance, but focuses especially on the promises of eternity.  Although I haven't stepped foot in that building since that day more than 12 years ago, the memory of that place holds a hallowed place in my heart.

Which is why I am so excited to be able to take my girls on a tour of that building tomorrow!  It's a very rare thing for an LDS temple to be made open to the public or to even to younger members of the church who are not normally permitted to enter.  Public tours typically only happen for a brief period after the initial building construction is complete and before the building is dedicated.  In this case, the Boise temple just underwent a significant reconstruction/renovation and will be re-dedicated in a couple of weeks – tomorrow is the final day of the public open house.

Now we're approaching the end of a year where I've spent a lot of time connecting with my daughters in many new ways (taking the summer off from work makes that possible in heavy doses).  I can't wait to introduce them to the place of one of my most special memories.  As we tour that sealing room and walk around its altar where Heather and I knelt so many years ago I hope they will begin to understand how meaningful it has been to me to have built our relationship in the way that we did.  I hope they can understand how essential it has been to our family's life to have established our marriage in that place in that way at that time.  Perhaps most importantly, I hope that in that room - in my inevitable self-assessment of my performance as a husband and father - I can look at myself in those mirrors and confidently know that I'm keeping the promises made the last time I was there.

So we're off to Boise for the weekend.  I plan to return having introduced my daughters to something new and meaningful that will help them to know a bit more about where they came from.