I could promise to hold you and to cherish you. I could promise to be in sickness and in health. I could say, til death do us part. But I won’t. Those vows are for optimistic couples, the ones full of hope. And I do not stand here, on my wedding day, optimistic or full of hope. I am not optimistic, I am not hopeful, I am sure. I am steady. And I know that I am a heart woman. I take them apart and I put them back together and I hold them in my hands. I am a heart woman.
So this I am sure, you are my partner, my lover, my very best friend, my heart, my heart beats for you. I want so badly to be able to explain all the love I have for you. Not the love of butterflies and stomach knots—but more the blurring of self and the entanglement with another soul.
Love is a word that is much too soft and used far too often to ever describe the fierce, infinite and blazing passion that I have in my heart for you. You are a million dreams and a million prayers of a little girl come true. You are kind. You are silly. You are intelligent. Your laugh is contagious. You acknowledge my strengths and accept my faults. You make me want to be a better person every day. I take you as you are now, tomorrow and for eternity to come, to be my husband.
I can’t promise to love you perfectly, but I will love you messily, overwhelmingly, inexorably. Even when the day comes that we’re old and gray, I promise to always see you with the same eyes and the same heart that I see you with at this exact moment.
So today, I vow to honor you and respect you, support you and encourage you. I promise to dream with you, celebrate with you, and walk beside you through whatever life brings. I vow to laugh with you and comfort you during times of joy and times of sorrow.
I promise to always pursue you, to fight for you, and love you unconditionally and wholeheartedly for the rest of my life. You are my best friend and I’m the luckiest person on Earth to call you mine.
Authored by Macnata Paykue
Featured Picture by Unsplash
