Encounters

I wasn't going to mention this, but I was excited about something that happened this weekend and wanted to write about it. My husband and I help lead Marriage Encounter weekends about once a year, and I just returned from one today.

I very much did not want to go this time. It was far enough away that we needed to fly out, meaning mostly that I needed to take 2 personal days from work (during which I have to plan for someone else to do my job), get progress reports and report cards ready before I left, and make arrangements for someone to watch our kids over the weekend, take them to school on Friday and Monday... on and on. But it ended up being worth it.

On husband told us at the end that his wife had put a notice about the weekend near the phone, and he kept hoping it would get accidentally thrown away. In fact, he considered several times accidentally throwing it away himself because he so did not want to go. But at the end of the weekend he said that it was the "single best thing we have done for our relationship in the 16 years we've been together."

But the real biggie was "Maggie." Maggie and "Charles" were in their 50s and had been married over 20 years. Maggie came down to see the 4 leader couples about a half hour after the rest of the couples had left the room on Saturday night. She was sobbing and could barely get the words out. She said the weekend was awful for them. Charles wasn't listening to her at all; he was right and she was wrong; he just wasn't "getting it." In fact, she didn't even know where he was at the moment, and assumed that they would be leaving for home before breakfast.

They sat at my table at Sunday breakfast-- a surprise in itself because I thought they'd be gone. Further surprise: Charles was talking about art, about a sculpture that symbolized walking from darkness into the light. Maggie sighed and said, "That's a good metaphor for this weekend." He smiled at her and nodded. Later Charles talked about how he was understanding things he had never known before, and that he was able to hear and understand his wife better. Maggie used words like "miracle." I was glad I went even though I didn't want to and got to be a part of the beginning of things changing for them.

SO-- if you are reading this and happen to be married, I think you should go on a Marriage Encounter weekend. (The next one in Spokane is November 11-13, which admittedly is quite short notice. But if you've always wanted to see Tukwila in February....)

If you are not married and have stuck it out thus far, let me try to find other weekend tidbits of interest.

~We listened to my new Muse CD on the way to the airport. I think they remind me of Queen, while my husband thinks it reminds him of U2.

~We flew on a small plane(20 rows of seats) that was too small for me to carry on my carry-on luggage. However, I did get to sit just behind the wing on the window seat on both trips. I love that feeling at the moment you leave the ground, and I love watching the ground pull away. Still, I wished a few times I was on indy's widdle Airbus.

~I looked for any signs of a university as I flew into the Cleveland airport. Silly, I know, but how often am I in Ohio? It felt a bit like someone saying to me, "Oh, you're from New York? Do you happen to know Thomas Fields?" Ohio was lovely-- what I saw from the air and the drive to the hotel anyway.

~One of the men presenting with us had lived on the same dormitory floor in college as Stephen Donaldson. He told us that Donaldson's father was a medical missionary that worked in India with lepers and that in college Donaldson told him that one of his goals in life was to write a book or series with a leper as the hero/ anti-hero. I thought specifically of Keppet and tried to weasel out some Donaldson tidbits from him, but alas, my efforts were fruitless.