“I Do” is a Blank Check

My husband and I went to a marriage seminar through our church in June. One of the things they said that really stuck with me was how marriage vows are a blank check. When we are young and in love, with little of life’s stresses weighing us down it is quite easy to say “For better, for worse, for richer, for poorer, in sickness and in health, until death do us part,” when we don’t actually have a clue how all of that will play out.

The cost of the commitment you make is paid in the years to come, not at the time you make it. But 10, 20, 30 years into a marriage you can put images and memories with those statements. And if you’re lucky, those images teach you more about the strength of the relationship and commitment you have to each other and make your love that much stronger.

I’ve thought about that in the 10 years of my own marriage, and I think now about what will come in the decades ahead of us.

And I sit here watching my aunt, care for her sick husband, and I see the vows playing themselves out. She sits round the clock at his bedside. She wakes throughout the night to adjust him, to give him water, to scratch his itches. She takes care of his most basic human body functions. He’s 94 and his body is failing, you can imagine what those might be.

30 years ago (they are 40 years apart in age) she said “For better, for worse, for richer, for poorer, in sickness and in health, until death do us part.” She sits listening to his pain, easing it in whatever way she can. She stares at his 100 pound body, telling him how much she loves him. Seeing him for the man he was, and underneath the skeletal frame and sunken eyes, still is. He calls her by name, then calls her “My sweetheart” in one of his moments of lucidity. This is the amount on the blank check being filled in and cashed. This is the cost of commitment.