L'Engle on Marriage

I just finished reading Madeleine L'Engle's book Two-Part Invention: The Story of a Marriage.  I really enjoyed it, mostly because it's about marriage and I love being married to Mark.

Here is just one of the quotes I copied down into my commonplace book:

I loved my children, but I hungered for adult conversation.  One day after a rare evening alone I wrote: I keep thinking about the evening we had together last night, my darling husband, alone by candlelight and firelight, and the way we were able to talk.  We are practically never alone together and this is a bad thing.  No matter how much we love our children there are many things we cannot talk about in front of them, things that we need from time to time say.  Let us try to remember for their sakes as well as ours that every once in awhile for our development we must be alone.

Amen to that.  :)

(This desire for conversation- just the two of us- is why Mark and I stay up so late every night.  Of course, now that our older kids stay up later, Mark and I have to stay up even later than we used to in order to get time together alone.  But it's worth it.) 

Madeleine adjusted her hours to her husband's work schedule.  He was an actor, and theatre hours meant that her husband would get home at 2 am.  She simply adjusted her schedule (and even her kids' schedules, after they had children) so that she would be awake when he arrived home, thereby allowing them to have time together.

It's a good reminder to me that prioritizing our marriage- and specifically, time alone together- doesn't come without sacrifice, but it is so important.