Tomorrow I will wake up at 5:30 a.m., leave Chicago, and drive through the rainy Illinois countryside in hopes of reaching Des Moines, Iowa, by noon. I will be running on very little sleep and I will using every ounce of strength in me not to scream or panic or otherwise freak out about the fact that westbound I-80 is, in fact, Hell on Earth. I will be dropping $40 for each tank of gas my car burns up. I will eat garbage that I buy at truck stops and cling to the dream of stepping out of the vehicle without looking back.
And why, you ask? Because two of my friends are marrying each other this weekend.
Two people, so wildly in love with each other, making vows and plans and both knowing that today, while wonderful, is only the beginning. Some will say they will never be more in love with each other than when they stand at the altar; I say that's not true.
Again, why? I believe in my heart of hearts that the union between loving adults is the purest thing in the world. And I mean that - between two people who love each other. Not people who need or like or want or better hurry up with each other. Not people who hear the clock ticking. Not people who see a means to an end.
People - men, women - who find in the eyes of another the endless possibilities of their life together. That they will lift each other up and lay each other down. That one's successes are the other's joys. That when one falls, the other will catch them. To have and to hold, forever and ever.
They will stand there, hand in hand, rings and vows exchanged, and in the moment they say those two simple words we all will know what they mean.
One moment together becomes a lifetime together. They will grow, they will laugh, they will cry and then laugh once more. And through those times they will be reminded time and again what they meant when they said what they said:
I love you.
and then
I do.
Through years and months and days and hours and simple time together, what is clear now becomes unspoken and understood later; David and Liz, you have only just begun.
I'm sure of it.