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Like typical 20+ year old's of our time, we walked into marriage super excited, young, hearts full, heads slightly empty — but certain we were beyond ready to take on the world. With no roadmap outside of the Bible, no seemingly sensible guarantees, and a belief that love and grit could carry us. That first stop was Albuquerque, New Mexico — dry skies, new dreams, and reality slapping us both like a sandstorm. We lasted four months before turning the car east and heading home to North Carolina.
Studly — my soon-to-be soldier, my best friend — wrestled with disappointment with His Creator. Why wasn’t the path clearer? Why did that desert chapter feel like a dead end instead of a beginning? He wouldn’t get answers right away. But God’s timing is rarely convenient — and never random.
Back near family, I prepared for something permanent — motherhood. When our firstborn arrived, we were undone in the best way. He was tiny, perfectly formed, heaven-sent. But I quickly discovered that postpartum wasn’t just a word in a brochure. It was exhaustion, loneliness, and self-sacrifice — multiplied by distance. Studly was in basic training, and then off again for AIT. The Army wasn’t about to slow down for a new dad or a new mom.
That winter was an unexpected jacked up whirlwind — Christmas leave, our first anniversary, New Year’s Eve labor, and then a kiss goodbye as Studly shipped out again. Raw. That’s the word. I was left staring at a newborn with tears in my eyes, ongoing unwelcomed postpartum lower abdominal contractions, and a strange ache in my bones — the kind only God can really comfort.
Year two came with another move — Fort Meade this time. I made the drive twice before we settled in. Our little VW Golf, the first car we bought new, took us faithfully back and forth. It was a season of figuring it out — of marriage growing up while still feeling so utterly brand new. We made space for joy — dates to the commissary for grocery shopping, window shopping dates, frequent trips to see different sites in Washington D.C., a lavish date night at Chili’s, the Kennedy Center in something other than jeans, and a night laughing over devilish desserts at a 60s-style diner like teenagers in love. That kind of laughter keeps a marriage soft, even when life stays hard.
Then came another shift — Ft. Ritchie, which was winding down. We ended up across the border in Pennsylvania, in a modest duplex that looked like it was stuck in the 70's, trying to find rhythm while the Army kept making the rules. My second pregnancy and labor were covered — all but ten dollars — and I counted even that as grace. Motherhood, again. Love multiplied.
In 1999, Studly narrowly missed a hardship tour to Korea. Instead, the Army sent us to Fort Greely, Alaska. I didn’t understand it. Another post set to close? But God knew. That strange tundra became a sacred chapter. Moose, the ugliest creatures ever that moved like gazelles, bigger than minivans, caribou that roamed like ghosts, trees that never seemed to grow up — it was wild and still somehow holy. We braved sun that never set and winters that never ended. We celebrated the end of one millennium and the start of another differently: Studly in a one month freezing tundra winter training, and me as a single mom of two back home on post…. Followed by our third baby born beneath northern lights and layers of thermal gear.
When it was time to leave the Army, Studly walked into his dream job — on air at a Christian radio station in Arizona. Mornings, then afternoons, his voice reached thousands. But behind the mic, we were still walking through real life. Miscarriages. A couple more babies. Political instability. Unexpected pivots. But we saw God's hand at every turn. While Studly sometimes admits to bitterness in those early days, I see something else: preparation. God wasn’t punishing — He was pruning.
Then came the Philippines.
There are no words that do that season justice. Mission work overseas was noisy, beautiful chaos. Manila was alive in a way that overwhelmed and awakened us. Culture shock gave way to culture love. We saw God in the market stalls and the traffic mess, in the quiet faith of believers who had so little, but praised so loud. For almost ten years our kids grew up watching what trust in God really looks like — not on a Sunday morning, but in everyday survival in that metropolitan chaos.
It’s where our seventh — and last — child was born. The final note in our family’s symphony, arriving not in chaos, but in clarity. A full-circle moment that felt like closure and beginning, all at once.
It’s where I got to finish out the childhood I’d painfully left behind — not in the same shoes, but on the same soil. A couple of decades removed, but finally, back home. Not the kind you just live in, but the kind that lives in you, long after you’ve gone.
And it’s where our kids — each one of them a patchwork of stories and nations — finally came to understand the beauty of their own roots. As Filipinos. As Third Culture Kids. As bridges between worlds.
They didn’t just learn about their heritage — they lived it. And in doing so, they learned to honor it. And so did I.
Now we’re back stateside. Four years and counting. Four kids have left the nest and three of them have built their own. Yes, whole-house hot water and grocery stores with spacious parking lots are nice. But I’m reminded daily that comforts can clutter. Jesus warned us not to build our lives on treasures that rust. And yet, there’s beauty in the reconnection too — old friends, familiar places, the circle coming back around.
It’s becoming clearer with every year — marriage isn’t just about sharing a house, a bed, or the calendar pages as they turn. No, it’s something far deeper, grittier, and more sacred. Marriage is about growing up — not once, but again and again — with someone who sees your flaws and still chooses you every morning.
It’s about weathering storms you didn’t see coming, and enduring fires that reveal the impurities in both of you — not to destroy, but to refine. It’s the acid test of time, and you don’t walk it alone. You walk it shoulder to shoulder with the one God handpicked and prepared to walk it with you.
It’s about becoming more resilient with every new challenge. Not because you stayed the same, but because you learned how to bend without breaking. You grow — together — into something more unshakable than you were apart.
And at the end of the day, when the world goes quiet, there’s a quiet comfort in knowing: you’ve got the best person in the world beside you. And they’ve got you.
And deeper still — beneath the laughter, the trials, and the years — the love we’ve shared, the grace extended, and the endurance refined and tempered in the heat of every breakdown and breakthrough… it all reflects something far greater. A living mirror of Christ’s own love. His grace. His long-suffering patience. His kindness that never runs dry. Our marriage, at its best and even at its most broken, is a sacred echo of the covenant He keeps with us.
So that’s the short version. Thirty years of movement (18 house-to-house moves), of messes, of miracles. I don’t know what the next thirty will bring. Maybe more grandbabies. Maybe a little less adventure and a little more rest. But probably not. Because God rarely calls us to padded places and the lull of the known, nor emotional autopilot, numb zones, where growth goes to sleep, or places where faith isn't required.
What I do know is this — I want thirty more years of Studly. Of our weird, but fun laughter. Of our faith-walk. Of looking back together and saying, “We made it through that too.”
We’ll begrudgingly take the wrinkles. I’ll pray to keep what’s left of my hair. And we’ll keep trusting the One who’s always been writing the story — even when we couldn’t see the plot, when the storyline seemed to go off the rails, and even when it seemed the Author wrote in invisible ink.
Amen to that.
