Becoming Real

^^This sweet shot was taken by my younger sister, Megan, who is serving a full-time LDS mission in Santa Rosa, CA. Meg has three months left until she is home.^^

Last week {or maybe the week before that} one of my very favorite bloggers, Meg Fee, posted a quote from The Velveteen Rabbit that has stuck with me ever since I read it. It reads:

"You become. It takes a long time. That's why it doesn't happen often to people who break easily, or have sharp edges, or who have to be carefully kept. Generally, by the time you are Real, most of your hair has been loved off, and your eyes drop out and you get loose in the joints and very shabby. But these things don't matter at all, because once you are Real you can't be ugly, except to people who don't understand." -Margery Williams

Like I said before, I simply could not get this quote off my mind. I think I love it so much because as far as I'm concerned it is about as accurate as a quote can get. It perfectly explains what I feel like I've been doing for the past three years or so. Trager and I have had our fair share of "becoming" opportunities as we try to figure out what our future holds. We've had so many "loose joint" and "shabby" moments where we kind of went, "Are we 'Real' yet? Can we be done now?" And even while I was I asking these questions I think I always knew the answer was the same..."Nope, you're not quite done yet!" It was easy to feel at times that this process of "becoming" was never ending and despite my wishing it wasn't the case, I still don't really feel like this process has an end date. 

But, I do feel like it eventually gets easier.

The past two months have brought something new for us...a light at the end of the tunnel. We've got some options on the table that we are prayerfully considering. Yet, ironically, as we get closer to figuring out the next step in our life my strongest emotion isn't what I expected. I remember how I always felt like I would be so relieved and excited to close this chapter in our lives, and while I am so relieved and excited, I'm also really, really grateful we went through all the worry and stress and frustration we did. It made us a little more "real," a little more tough, and a whole lot closer than I think we would have been had things come more easily. I know we are ready for whatever comes next in our lives simply because we made it through all the unknown this chapter held. 

One piece of advice I would give to anyone who feels like this is what they are going through... I highly suggest finding someone like Trager Hintze to go through it with you. Not only does it make it easier, but  I can imagine it will be fun to look back on together years from now :)

{And by years, I do mean years.}

Now about that picture...those of you who don't know Meg, may be wondering why I used her name tag picture for this post, but if you do have the privilege of knowing her you'll understand. Part of why making it through the last year and a half has been doable is because I have the example of Sister Gowens. Meg has been "becoming" on her mission and she's doing it solo. Any time things were extra tough in life I would always think, "If Meg can do all that she's doing, I can do this." 

I really needed her strong example of how to be a stud at "becoming."