No Mud. No Lotus.

There are many things I thought I'd experience in my life.

Divorce is certainly not one of them.

No one goes into a marriage with expectations of divorce.

People experience many things.

Cold feet.

Nerves.

Jitters.

Excitement.

Me?

I had butterflies in my stomach on my wedding day.

Butterflies as I experienced one of the biggest moments of my life.

I was surrounded by family and friends.

I was in love. I was loved.

I wasn't young. I waited. I found the right person.

I knew what I wanted.

I knew when I said yes.

I can see myself - feel what I was feeling.

I had a good life.

A wonderful life.

And then.

I became a mom.

And life changed some.

Parents. We were parents. We are parents.

Those moments - I'll remember them always.

Looking into the eyes of my person.

The person who experienced this shift in their life at the exact moment I did.

The person who held my hand as we three made ourselves a family.

Made ourselves a home.

The person who held my hand through the mud.

And then.

We experienced so very much.

Loss. Grief. Pain.

Laughter. Love. Joy. Happiness.

These things cycled throughout our lives.

Parenting. Motherhood. Fatherhood.

Exhaustion. Emotion. Frustration.

Work. Friendships. Relationships.

And then.

A decade and some later.

Life changed some more.

Our hands slipped from one another.

We loosened our grasp. 

We didn't know the plan.

It mattered not.

For it is not always for us to know.

Because if we did - what steps would we have taken?

What challenges would we have allowed ourselves to face?

What pain? What losses? What anger and hurt?

And so, instead we found the moments.

We find the moments.

We stop - we think - we take notice.

Do we ever expect the mud to surround us?

Even in the deepest of floods we don't anticipate that it may swallow us whole.

And when it does we don't always think we'll find our way out.

But we will.

We always do.

Our story isn't over yet.

We're strong.

We live through.

Persevere.

We grow.

We thrive.

We prosper.

We flourish.

No mud.

No lotus.

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