New Worlds: My Dad is getting married!

With my mom's illness and passing come the immersion into new worlds; and today I am talking about a whole new world, romance and all. A post that I have been looking forward to writing. Honestly. I have. My Dad is getting married. 

My Dad is awesome. He's also human and flawed, as we all are. But also, and more than that, he is awesome. He stood by my mom, he knelt by my mom, he carried my mom, he walked and washed and supported my mom in every way possible through her illness. And he has met someone who has done the same for their spouse. Who loved a spouse through illness. Who cared for daughters while loving a spouse through illness. They both kept their faith, their relationships and their sanity through a lengthy illness and death of a spouse. On the other side, they have found love again. 

It's truly amazing the similarities. They both raised kids in the same small town. They both trained as teachers. They were Christians in the same circles. They loved some of the same friends. They both had swimming pools in their backyards. They both have daughters almost exactly 2 years apart (us 2 years and 2 days, them 2 years and 3 days). My Dad taught her daughters. I met her at the Chiropractors in 2012.  Dad and mom attended a baptism at their pool. She was the receptionist at the chiropractor's my Dad went to, who also happened to be close friends for both of them. In fact, the wife of the chiropractor had thought about introducing them but hadn't gotten that far yet. Hanging out with them is like Jory 1 and Jory 2. Seriously. Plus she can handle the boys (Colin and Paul) and all their teasing and can take the chaos of 7 grandkids in one place. 

We just got back from a night of wedding planning with Dad, Dee, Jenna, and one of Dee's daughters Deana (sadly her other daughter Leanne lives up in FSJ so she couldn't join us but she was very much with us via text). What a fun night of dreaming and planning, and oh so much teasing. Dad and Dee have very similar sense of humour, as do us kids, and it felt natural from the start. Dad and Dee have moved VERY quickly - so we joked that we couldn't do a wedding slideshow because it would just be two pictures. Then I made us take a group picture - their picture count is up to three! Weddings are so fun to plan, but of course the bigger new reality is their marriage and their life together! They are just so excited and ready to get there. It's fun to be a part of. 

I asked a friend this summer how it was for her when her Mom remarried after her Dad's passing. Her mom has now been married 10 years. She said that some of the best advice she got was that, we don't know what our parents were like when they dated and fell in love and got married. That we might see sides of our parents that we haven't seen before. It might be or feel strange, but it doesn't mean it isn't true to them since we weren't there the first time around. Watching my Dad blush and giggle and have all of these feelings...well it's been a new experience. He's head over heels, or as we have been saying, smitten, and it's a delight to see. It's certainly a new side of him.

Blogging about a new relationship is strange. I've been able to blog about my mom....well, because she couldn't read. Plus she made it her life goal not to turn on a computer (she had to once and boy was she sad about that). But it matters to me that people see beyond the cute kid pics and the Christmas card photos in my life (not that I've managed to send out Christmas card photos since Avie was born - how easy I had it then) and yet I want to honor and love and cover my Dad and his new wife. I don't know what it will look like to blog about this new thing. This beautiful thing. This real thing. I know that God is already doing a work in my heart - he is molding and growing and changing things inside of me. He is doing the same for every member our family, hers included. 

I want a mom. My Dad wants a wife who wants to be a mom to us. His fiancee wants to be that. I want a grandma for my kids (though the two they have already are amazing) on my side of the family. My Dad wants to marry someone that empowers him in his role as a grandpa. He has often mourned the fact that he couldn't take my kids for a weekend as a single grandpa. His fiancee wants to be a grandma, to my kids. There is so much that could go right and so much that could go wrong. My Dad's fiancee has kids. She's already a mom. She has grandkids. She's already a grandma. My Dad wants to be a grandpa to her kids. He wants to be a Dad to her girls. Oh, it could be so good, and oh it could be so hard. 

I want to be realistic. I want to be loving. I want to be kind. I want to have realistic expectations and, I'll admit, I want to self-protect. It's scary to have such high hopes. It's scary to love truly and deeply. It's scary to be vulnerable and admit my hopes and dreams. I don't know how this turns out. 

I do know that my Dad loves me - and loves all - loyally. He showed this in my mom's life and has shown this in my life over and over again. I know that his fiancee similarly has done the same. I don't know this personally but her daughters have spoken of her, and my Dad has spoken of her - and she is there for the people she loves. I also know that the moms in my life have been such a blessing - the aunts, the grandma's the mothers-in-law, the friends. The women who step up and show up. The women who drop everything and fly or drive to BC to help me. The women who drop everything and take a ferry to help me. The women who take my kids for a weekend so I can get away with Paul. The women who stay longer to do the dishes and fold the laundry and bring the dinners. The women who love my kids with gifts and toys and care; with ice cream cone toys (Avie's current obsession) and movie dates and ballet classes. I have seen women show up and fill the mom gaps in my life, and I feel the freedom to hope that this mom, this new female relationship, will be good news in my life, whatever that looks like. That I could be a blessing in her life as well - to love a new woman in my Dad's life. To enjoy her. To see her bring out another side of my Dad that I have missed, and to get to be a part of honoring and loving that woman. To get to build a new family with her kids - new sisters, deep relationships despite the lack of history. A blended family - where 'blend' is a positive (like Starbucks coffee) and not a negative.

There is much to gain or much to lose, but I will choose to enter this new relationship with faith, with hope, and with joy. Because the mourning has passed, a new day has come, and love is with us.