Marriage and Monterey

This past weekend Kevin and I attended Family Life’s “Weekend to Remember” marriage conference in Monterey. This was an engagement gift (nearly three years ago!) from Meredith’s parents. Because life was so chaotic the first couple years of marriage, this is the first real chance we’ve had to go.

We highly recommend this conference, if you haven’t been yet (and are married or engaged). It was absolutely fantastic. I cannot say enough good things about it. Kevin even said that we should probably go to this conference at least every five years for a tune-up and to make sure we’re still on the right path. Although I felt like we had an excellent marriage going into the conference, our weekend in Monterey only served to make it better. (And make us more grateful for God’s goodness to us in giving us the oneness that we have - not that "oneness" comes by default, 'cuz, actually, it takes a lot of work sometimes.) One thing I learned is that you shouldn’t wait until you have marriage problems to spend a weekend working on your marriage. I appreciated how the speakers (who were very down to earth, and also very humorous when sharing their own experiences) were constantly reminding us to NOT buy into how the culture views marriage but, rather, to seek out God’s will for marriage. After all, He is the one who created marriage. We also had to do a lot of “homework” – part of it on our own, and part of it as a couple. These homework sessions tended to spark a lot of introspection, discussion, and brainstorming for how to improve our relationship. Anyway, it was all excellent stuff! [Although Kevin did say that it’s amazing how much his guard was up the whole time at the conference – probably because of all the IBLP conferences he’s sat through and what he’s learned from that whole experience, i.e., when you walk into a seminar you have to keep your “filter” (i.e., God’s word and your own common sense) intact – or else you might end up believing everything you hear.]

Monterey, of course, was absolutely beautiful. I’ve been to this seaside village several times and it always impresses me. On Saturday we had a “mandatory” date night. (Ha!) We ate at a restaurant on the water and then went walking down to a little stretch of beach next to what was left of an old, decrepit building (basically just parts of the building’s foundation). Although we saw that the tide was coming in, we really didn’t bother to pay attention to how close it was getting to us on the shore. Within seconds of sitting down on this little cement block (at the end of the beach), we looked up to see this mammoth wave come crashing toward us. Just in the nick of time, we lifted our legs and the water rushed underneath us, spraying up into our faces. After that experience, we felt like we’d just evaded death, rather than merely avoiding getting drenched. (Maybe it was the adrenaline rushes and pounding hearts?) Anyway . . . I don’t know why I’m writing about this in my blog except to say that, not only was it really funny at the time, it was just one of those really unique bonding experiences. Know what I mean? After leaving the beach ruins, we walked around town for a while (on Cannery Row), got a free sample at Ghirardelli’s, and went to waste some more time at the oceanfront. And that was the best thing of all . . . being able to waste time together. I think one of the best things about heaven will be having absolutely no time constraints. [Although there's apparently no marriage in heaven, so that would be a bummer. But Kevin and I have already agreed that we'll share a mansion, regardless. So, that will be good.]