Vows.

Sometimes beautiful things unfold. Sometimes ideas, wishes, dreams come true. Sometimes ideas play themselves out to become something completely different than what you thought. Something completely more perfect and perfectly more complete.

Marcus Nielson was an idea. A curiosity.

The one unattainable wonder that I somehow obtained. It was through a rare chain of events that we met and a marvel that we got along so well. He is nothing of what I had supposed and yet everything of what I needed. 

He is charming. Traditional. Suave. 

And he has that Scandinavian cheek hue that lights up in accordance to his mood. You know the one—that blush that can put an Arizona sunset to shame. That same one that has always made me swoon.

He is the place that I want to be. The air that I want to breathe. The smile that I want to grin. With him I am alive.

You know that sensation? The one you got as a kid when you had a big gob of sweet, Bubblicious chewing gum. It was so good that you had to use all your will power not to swallow it; in your mind you knew that once you swallowed it, it would be gone, and yet your body yearned for that satisfaction so bad. That’s how I feel when I’m with him—if I didn’t know the consequences, I might just eat him, perhaps that could bring me the satisfaction I desire.

Oh, he is good. He’s even better than that. There isn’t a word encompassing enough for a man like him, just like there is not a color vivid enough for his perfect hair. “Mmm.” That’s the closest noise I can sound to embody his essence…and that hair.

I love his polka dots. I love his eyes. They beam bright with the song of a sunflower. Yes! A sunflower! And that voice. I could die in his song. Or those arms. But I’d rather live. Live within it. I’d rather experience each laugh, and tear, and smile, and song, and sunflower. I’d rather see each blush, and color, and sunset. I’d rather feel each kiss, and dance, and shiver. I want to taste it all, and hear it all, and feel it all. With him.

I’m kind of a hippie. 

He’s kind of a traditionalist. 

And yet here we stand, 

kind of perfect for each other. 

He is the greatest person I have ever known, and thanks to the promises made in the temple today, 

we are greater than the sum of our parts.

So Marcus, 

“Now that we have seen each other, if you'll believe in me, I'll believe in you. 

Is that a bargain?”

{LoveChild}

I was born a surprise. I call myself a Love Child. I was conceived by unadulterated love rather than precise intention.

My parents always wanted a big family. Seven children later they thought they had accomplished such a feat. For six years my older sister, Leisel, happily filled the role of baby of the family—coddled and esteemed, she was content to be the last.

My mother was 43 years old when the news came. Her whole life, she had never been wrong (about anything) and this case was no different. For you see, as a little girl eight was always her number. The very sound of seven was the one reality that never quite sat well with her. So while the baby was “unexpected” or “unintended” it certainly was not “unplanned”. For her, the planning had happened long before, in the past, back in a time when she lived life in “pretend”. She had only forgotten about this plan for a little while, that’s all. So when she found out she was pregnant, she only looked up, nodded her head and said, that’s right. For others I was a surprise, for her I was an elapsed dream realized.

I was born to women who could be my grandmother and I shared a birthday with a brother who was old enough to be my father. A strange life—yes, but one I can’t imagine wanting any different. I do not have memories of my siblings’ t-ball games or dance recitals, but I have a charming relationship with each of them untainted by youthful quarrels. My father may not have been able to pick me up and throw me on his back as we ran around the yard, but he had come to a maturity that was temperate and wise. My mother did not take me out to get chocolate ice cream with her because she was having a menstrual craving, but she had the good old fashion skills to teach me how to bake and sew. My parents may not be around to see me have my last child, but I got to live a life unique to that of my friends, unique to even that of my siblings. I got to be my parents very own Love Child.