Choosing a Wife for My Son

Last Tuesday was our anniversary. Eight years since we said our I Do’s. Crazy.

Every year on our anniversary, we go back to that same park and stand under those same trees and smash our lips together and take selfies.

And I sat, last week, editing and deleting pictures, and thinking about some deep reflections on marriage I could write to go along with them. Or a fun list of tips or lessons learned, or something. I might still do that.

But as I sat and mused and sipped my lukewarm coffee, my mind wandered to my dad, as it usually does on milestones these past five months. I pondered and wondered and smiled at the idea that I really did, in a lot of ways, marry my father. Freud would be so smug.

As I turned the idea over in my mind, the nine-month-old toddler across the room stood up from his pile of alphabet magnets and waddled over to me. I slid to the floor, scooped him in my arms for a hug and a slobber, and had a minor epiphany.

It has often struck me that Husband and I need to be the people we want to raise him to be. Because, “Do as I say,” will not work for long, and never in the ways that really matter.

But I realized, on my wedding anniversary, that if there is a good chance he is going to grow up and marry a young woman much like his mother – then I especially need to be the kind of woman I want him to marry. If he is going to unconsciously create a standard for, and an expectation of, women based on the example he sees most in his life – then what am I helping him create?

What kind of woman do I want for him someday? It’s already time to decide.

I want him to fall in love with a woman who loves God, so am I modeling what she looks like? Will he recognize the difference between a woman who only runs to God when she needs a miracle, and a woman who searches Him out every day?

I want him to value a woman who is patient and humble enough to love and serve people, because she will be a woman who will love and serve her husband too. I want him to be able to wait for a woman who values honesty and hard work and education. I want him to have the wisdom to chase after a woman who is full of grace and passion and life.

But little boys tend to not be so drawn away by fairy tales, so is this woman real? How do her eyes speak? What do her arms feel like? What does grace sound like on her lips, and what does love look like in her hands?

Am I showing him? Am I setting that kind of example? Helping him build that kind of standard? If he meets her, will she seem familiar? Comfortable?

Every day I’m setting him up with a girl two decades from now. Do I like her?