- My wife and I just had a baby boy!!!!!!!!!!!! He came a week early prior to his due date, and he is so perfect and wonderful :) My wife has more pictures and/or stories on her blog - check it out if you know where it is!
- My wife and I are also about to graduate!!! 4-5 years of schooling almost complete... While I know I want to go on to graduate school someday, it won't be like undergraduate. (That is both a good thing and a not so good thing.) However, currently, we're both very excited to be done with homework, tests, and classes, and move on with other realms of life!!
- Those new realms of life... Are an adventure :) Where we will live after graduation depends a lot on where I get a full-time job. And that depends a lot on the connections I make now and the direction in life I want to pursue. However....
- The success of all of the above really depends on how I live my life in accordance with the principles of the Gospel. As much as praying or reading the scriptures will not automatically give me a job or help us pay bills, living in accordance with true principles and especially living a life that God would be pleased with would make me and my family happier than anything else. And because I trust that God always wants what is best for me, doing His will means that I come to know what He wants for me - which is always better and brings more happiness than my will for me.
- Update - I just got a new job!!! Working in program management and development at a company about 7 minutes away from our apartment. This means my wife, new baby and I get to stay in our apartment! YAY!!!!!! More story comes later, but suffice it to say I couldn't have gotten this job without Heavenly Father's help :)
Okay, now for something that I've been thinking about a lot recently....
My wife and I watched Emma and Pride and Prejudice in the past two weeks. (Full disclosure: I am a big Jane Austen fan. No, I didn't start out that way, but my wife didn't "convince" me either. More on that in a bit ;) While I enjoy those movies very much, I am not very fond of romantic movies. Okay, MOST of them. You know the kind I'm talking about though. The formulaic movies that bring an incredibly attractive couple together and puts them through "trials" and has "bad things" happen, but their love is enough to overcome it in the end. (I'm looking at you, Safe Haven) Right? Well, as entertaining as these movies might be, or as cheesy as they could be, there's something about them that always bothers me. The "trials" and "bad things" can be insignificant or cheesy, but more than that, the movies always view the beginning of the relationship as the end of the movie. Either "getting back together" after the breakup or the marriage after a long, hard engagement. And the lines, "And they lived happily ever after."
I don't mean to say that I hate romantic movies. I love Disney movies, and often they have a strong element of romance in the main characters getting married and whatnot. (And I think the origin of those lines, "They lived happily ever after".) I admitted earlier that I really like Jane Austen movies - part of the reason is because the couple isn't perfect. In Pride and Prejudice, both the characters are stubborn, prideful and a bit petty - yet they focus on what truly matters and realize that they love each other completely. However, this brings up the same problem - the movie ends with them getting married. What happens after that??
While I don 't feel that this is a cause of bad marriages in America, I feel like it contributes to a misunderstanding of what real relationships are. Real, lasting relationships aren't founded on physical attraction and witty banter. While those aren't necessarily bad aspects, if that's all the relationship is standing on then the foundation of the relationship is pretty weak. True love is much more than petty or shallow attributes. True love is coming home after a long day of work and doing the dishes and cleaning the kitchen because you see your spouse is exhausted at the end of their long day too. True love is making dinner for them when they're stressed out, or doing laundry so they don't have to, or holding them and telling them how beautiful or handsome they look when they don't feel particularly beautiful or handsome. True love is sacrifice. Sacrificing your wants and needs in order to "anxiously attend the happiness of your spouse" - (President Gordon B. Hinckley) In fact, true love is...
My wife and I watched Emma and Pride and Prejudice in the past two weeks. (Full disclosure: I am a big Jane Austen fan. No, I didn't start out that way, but my wife didn't "convince" me either. More on that in a bit ;) While I enjoy those movies very much, I am not very fond of romantic movies. Okay, MOST of them. You know the kind I'm talking about though. The formulaic movies that bring an incredibly attractive couple together and puts them through "trials" and has "bad things" happen, but their love is enough to overcome it in the end. (I'm looking at you, Safe Haven) Right? Well, as entertaining as these movies might be, or as cheesy as they could be, there's something about them that always bothers me. The "trials" and "bad things" can be insignificant or cheesy, but more than that, the movies always view the beginning of the relationship as the end of the movie. Either "getting back together" after the breakup or the marriage after a long, hard engagement. And the lines, "And they lived happily ever after."
I don't mean to say that I hate romantic movies. I love Disney movies, and often they have a strong element of romance in the main characters getting married and whatnot. (And I think the origin of those lines, "They lived happily ever after".) I admitted earlier that I really like Jane Austen movies - part of the reason is because the couple isn't perfect. In Pride and Prejudice, both the characters are stubborn, prideful and a bit petty - yet they focus on what truly matters and realize that they love each other completely. However, this brings up the same problem - the movie ends with them getting married. What happens after that??
While I don 't feel that this is a cause of bad marriages in America, I feel like it contributes to a misunderstanding of what real relationships are. Real, lasting relationships aren't founded on physical attraction and witty banter. While those aren't necessarily bad aspects, if that's all the relationship is standing on then the foundation of the relationship is pretty weak. True love is much more than petty or shallow attributes. True love is coming home after a long day of work and doing the dishes and cleaning the kitchen because you see your spouse is exhausted at the end of their long day too. True love is making dinner for them when they're stressed out, or doing laundry so they don't have to, or holding them and telling them how beautiful or handsome they look when they don't feel particularly beautiful or handsome. True love is sacrifice. Sacrificing your wants and needs in order to "anxiously attend the happiness of your spouse" - (President Gordon B. Hinckley) In fact, true love is...
*Note: The Princess Bride is also one of my favorite movies of all time. I now it's an example of the traditional romance story: hero woos girl, fights dangers, and ends with marriage. But.... I also love this song to death. So just bear with me.
So where am I going with all of this? I'm not quite sure. But let me tell you about a movie that I want to see someday. I want someone to make a movie that begins with a marriage, and that follows the couple throughout their life. I want a movie that shows how hard it is to get through 20 years of marriage and trials and heartbreak and home disasters (many of which come from little and older children). I want a movie that watches a weary husband and wife come together at the end of the long day and reassure each other of how much they love each other. I want a movie where a man defending a woman isn't always physically fighting off another man, but reassuring her with words of love or defending her in conversations with others. I want a movie that shows how love grows with the addition of children, and watches one spouse fall in love again with the other as they watch them play with their little ones. I want a movie that shows true love, and how it's sometimes hard and brutal but ALWAYS worthwhile.
I might be a hopeless romantic, but I believe that true love gives the real purpose and meaning to life. Love of family and love of God. If you truly love both, and you do things in your life that strengthen your love for both - spending time with family, praying and spending time with God, sacrificing yourself for both, etc. - then you will find true happiness. The times that I do so in my own life, I LOVE life. In those moments, I can't possibly be happier. True love brings eternal happiness.
And so we go.
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