This weekend, something purely miraculous happened. I got dressed in real clothes. And real hair. As in not running shorts and a ponytail. AND Matt and I went out together! Without kids! IN REAL CLOTHES! If you think this is not blog-worthy, then you just don’t even know.
After moving in a few weeks ago, a neighbor asked me if I’m a runner. “I’ve noticed that you’re always dressed in running clothes,” she added. I paused. “Well. Define ‘runner’,” I wanted to ask. Because, there was that 10k I ran a few (ELEVEN) years ago. It doesn’t matter how many friends I have with that fancy 26.2 sticker on their car; that dumb 10k will forever be the crowning moment of my ohsobrief running career.
I hardly got the words “uh, nope” out of my mouth before she began inviting me to her running group. Her running group that trains for ONE HUNDRED MILE RACES. 100. Miles. Apparently, that’s a thing. People do that. At one point, I was being educated on the ins and outs of ultra marathons when it occurs to me- my poser-self was standing around in running shoes while my new 100-mile-friend just happened to be dressed like a normal person. In normal people clothes. And just like that, I vowed to start getting dressed more often.
This weekend was my chance for success. (Success at getting dressed. Not running. Come on, people.) Wedding season has arrived, and it began with Rebekah. We’ve known Rebekah since the days Matt helped with the student ministry at our old church, and we were thrilled to head to Richmond for her big day. It was such a beautiful wedding, made even more beautiful by the fact that it was held at the same church where Matt and I were wed nearly ten years ago. As we waited for the wedding to begin, Matt and I whispered back and forth.
“I don’t remember doing any of this.” “Shut up, of course you do.” “You’re sure we got married here?” “YES we got married here. Of course we got married here.” “I don’t know. That was so long ago. I don’t remember this AT ALL.” “Stop being dumb. I totally do. I think.
We settled on the fact that we did indeed get married. At that same church. Almost ten years ago. Dude, marriage is hard.
Moving on. So I posted the above picture on Instagram and people were all, “oh y’all look great! what an adorable couple!” which made me feel like I may have misled everyone. Because what I didn’t post was…
the “hey! let’s take a selfie by the butt statue!” picture. You can dress us up…
Okay. Now that we’ve established that we’re very sophisticated individuals, deeply appreciative of the arts, shall we move on? We shall.
Miracle #2. We spent an entire 24 hours alone sans kids. This rarely happens. And by “rarely”, I mean next to never. This is not a good thing, I know. All of the marriage books tell us that we’re failures because we’re not getting away for enough date nights and just-the-two-of-us vacations and whateverelse together. And YES these are all good things. Great things. Things that I wish existed all the time in our reality. But apparently our reality is not the same as the MarriageBookAuthors reality because, you see, we have these three small people in our home called OUR KIDS. Kids who need adults. Adults who, incidentally, are not banging down our front door begging to watch our precious little blessings while we frolic in the tropics. (Though, if you happen to be one such adult, please call/write/send smoke signals.)
BUT. My inlaws offered to take the kids for the night. My parents offered to take the dog. And we were left with one choice. Freedom for one glorious night. In a mostly-decent, Priceline.com-special hotel. Where I would fall asleep by 10pm, rise by 5am, and jump up in the middle of the night exclaiming that “Matt! I hear the kids!” (I don’t remember this. Rumor has it that he had to remind my half-awakened self that we were in a hotel and that the kids were indeed not within earshot. Even for mom ears.)
Basically, it was the best weekend ever.
Just don’t ask how many days I’ve gotten dressed this week.
(The answer is one.)