Well, I’ve been married for a whopping eleven-ish days—and I love it!  Specifically, I love my wife.

Naturally, a good chunk of those days were spent living the sweet life aboard a Royal Caribbean cruise.  We went down to Puerto Plata in the Dominican Republic and to Royal Caribbean’s private island, Coco Cay.  It was my first cruise and I loved spending all of that quiet, relaxing, unstructured time with Dr. Wife.

Now, it’s back to Reality for both of us.  Dr. Wife is finishing up her residency in North Carolina and I’m still at my school in South Carolina, so we’re living apart during the weeks until she wraps up residency next summer.  That means we’re delaying the usual first-year-of-marriage stuff, like adjusting to living together full-time.

We’re both ready for it.  I crave the day that I am around Dr. Wife enough to want short amounts of time away from her (like holing up in my office and playing Civilization VII for a couple of hours—not like running off on some boys’ weekend or the like).  We’re both ready to come home to each other every day, not just on the weekends.  We’re ready to get into the grooves and rhythms of everyday life together.

It’s coming soon!  Dr. Wife has her home in North Carolina on the market; we are praying for offers.  She’ll stay in a long-term AirBnB once her home sells, which will cost a good deal less each month than the current mortgage payments and utilities on her home.  I’m listing my house soon, too, and am similarly praying for a quick sale.  I’ll reside in our new home once mine sells (or once she finishes residency, whichever happens first).  Owning three homes (gulp!) between us is not as glamorous as it sounds.

In the meantime, I’m gathering up our collective belongings and slowly moving them to our new house.  Monday night I started to load up piles and piles of LEGO sets in a big storage bin, with the hope of keeping them relatively intact (of course, if they all crumble into a massive mix of bricks in transit, I’ll just have the fun of rebuilding them all).  I’m listing random junk on Facebook Marketplace to unload more.

I’m also keeping Dr. Wife’s dog, Nugget, during the duration.  Nugget is amazing—she is a three-legged mutt of some kind, and she is an absolute doll.  But she doesn’t like my neighbor, Across the Field Jerry, who comes by to take Murphy out a couple of times a day.  Fortunately, Nugs is pretty good at holding her bladder; more importantly, she makes for a very sweet cuddle buddy.  Murphy sleeps on the floor at the foot of the bed; Nugget sleeps on the bed with me, curled up as closely as possible.  Her fur is like satin!

So, those are just some quick looks into these early days of our marriage.  Dr. Wife possesses a sweet, golden heart, and we are each other’s best friends and biggest supporters.  We’ve endured quite a bit already, and this exciting-but-busy next chapter will have its ups and downs.  We’re confident that we can tackle them together—along with Christ.