Where do you live?

My wife and I moved into a new apartment this week. We had lots of help loading the truck. Mormonism is good at many things, and helping those who move is certainly one-- several fellow congregants who know us only as passing acquaintances spent hours carrying heavy boxes due to our shared belief that when you are in the service of your fellow beings, you are in the service of God.

Moving has given plenty of opportunity to think about what my place of residence means-- in moving from one apartment to another, just a few blocks away, I'm leaving one community and congregation behind and joining another. Where I leave is not just geography, it's about webs of human relationships. My wife and I made many close friends in our old neighborhood, and decided to move in part because several families we were close to moved on, as transient college students are wont to do. While we had stayed in the same place, our community changed, and it was time to move on. 

Where has the time gone?

Six years ago, I started this blog. Four years ago, I abandoned it to serve a mission for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Almost three years ago, I returned, wiser and (for a while) quieter as I tried to process what I learned. Two years ago, I began posting again, with a greater sense of who I was and what I meant to say.

Two years ago I also began dating a woman who was smart enough to beat me at Scrabble, and kind enough to let me win sometimes. Who I could talk to for hours, about anything. Who has the wit and timing for a career in stand up comedy, but takes the serious things in life seriously. Who loves good music almost as much as she loves her family (and I know no one who has a stronger love of family). Whose faith in God led her to leave behind all she knew and face down opposition from those closest to her to do what God Required, and then used that faith to heal those relationships. 

And soon it seemed that all I had to say, I said to her, and all I wanted to do was be with her. 

And so I stopped posting, and wooed her. 

We've been married now for a year and a half, and I am happy every day, and grateful I could see the best chance in my life when it came my way. And now again I have new things I've learned, and new thoughts, and new things to say to the world. 

So here I am, and maybe you'll be seeing me more often.