Still Married Up (Seventeen Years Later)

I’ve said it for years, especially when Traci’s within earshot:  “I married up.”

Today, on our 17th anniversary, I feel like I need to put that in writing where the whole world can see it. Not as a joke, not as a throwaway line, but as the truest sentence I know about my life: I. Married. Up.

Seventeen years ago, somehow, this woman said “yes” to me.

She said yes to the guy with the stories and the dad jokes.  She said yes to the blended family, the money stress, the long drives, the weird medical detours we never saw coming.  She said yes to ordinary Tuesdays, to late-night Target runs, to kids on the couch, to Disney fireworks, to a life that has looked nothing like the brochure and everything like a covenant.

And for seventeen years, she has been the better part of every “we.”

When people see us now, they see the wheelchair, the bandana, the mask, the fight. They see the appointments and the scans and the way cancer tries to steal center stage. What I wish they could really see is who I get to see:

The woman who still lights up when she’s with her girls.  The woman who will spend every last ounce of energy to show up for their big moments.  

The woman who has been quietly, stubbornly strong long before any doctor ever used words like “tumor” or “swelling.”

I married up.

I married the girl who turned “my kids” into “our kids” without ever making a speech about it.  

The girl who made houses into homes with laughter, crafts, and the kind of little touches you only notice when they’re gone.  The girl who turned Disneyland trips into family lore, who will fight through pain just to feel Main Street under her wheels and fireworks in her chest.  The girl who has gone on endless adventures with me around the world and showed me true joy.  

I married the woman who has seen me at my absolute worst and never cashed out.

She’s watched me stretched thin, fried from work, smelling like hospital air and fast food and worry. She’s seen me drop balls, run out of patience, say the wrong thing, shut down instead of leaning in. And somehow, she still calls me her husband. She still reaches for my hand. She still lets me be her person.

Seventeen years in, “for better or worse, in sickness and in health” doesn’t feel like pretty words from a ceremony. It feels like pill boxes on the counter. It feels like waiting rooms and scan results and too many miles on the car. It feels like exhaustion… and it feels like choosing each other anyway.

If you only see the sickness part, you’re missing the story.

The story is her.

It’s the way she laughs at my stupid jokes even now.   It’s the way she softens when we talk about the kids and one day a grandbaby.  It’s the way she lets herself dream about the next Disney day, the next wedding, the next little thing to look forward to.

The story is the girl who walked down the aisle 17 years ago and the woman in the wheelchair today being the same soul: fierce, gentle, loyal, brave, funny, stubborn in all the best ways.

People tell me I’m “strong” or that I’m “such a good husband.” They have no idea. Whatever strength I have has been trained by watching her. Whatever faithfulness I have is a response to the way she’s loved me and our family.

I am just a man who got wildly lucky once, and has been trying for 17 years to live in a way that matches the gift he was given.

Traci, thank you for saying yes.  

Thank you for 17 years of “up.”  

Up in grace.  

Up in love.  

Up in memories that I will carry long after this body of yours is done fighting.

If I had to do it all over again, knowing everything we know now, every hard road, every hospital bracelet, every sleepless night?

I’d find you.  

I’d ask you.  

I’d marry up again.

Happy anniversary, babe.  

Here’s to every year we’ve got to borrow with you. Here’s to every year we’ve gotten that the calendar said we shouldn’t have.  

Here’s to every laugh that snuck in between scans and side effects.  

Here’s to every fireworks show, every Main Street stroll, every quiet Jeopardy night on the couch, every “remember when the kids…” story that makes your eyes light up.

Here’s to every year we’ve been given, and every moment still in front of us, however many or few there are.  

I married up 17 years ago.  

I’m still married up.  

And I’d choose you again in a heartbeat.