I am writing this as I sit on a flight to a sunny destination with my husband; the same man who has courageously fought to give our marriage another chance.

I am so grateful.

So much has changed in our lives over the past few years. We have aged. We have toughened. We are different now. The innocence we once had is gone.

Yet many things about us remain strangely familiar: our quirks and idiosyncrasies. One example of this, is that we are not sitting together on our flight. It baffles me how I can never seem to quite remember to check into Southwest Airlines early enough to get decent boarding numbers. My poor family doesn't even realize that families can sit together, because I can't recall a time we have ever been in the A boarding group. My husband smiles and knows this about me, and accepts it.

For him, I know that in a restaurant or public space, he has to sit and face the door. He has this man-protective nature about him, and like a guard dog protecting his home, he prefers to be keenly aware of his surroundings. These are things you can't know about a person until you've spent years and months and days and hours with them.

My heart is also heavy today at life's irony. Who am I, that second chances get offered? Who am I that a man I so carelessly threw aside during my infidelity, would now be willing to wait on our recovery and even go on a weekend getaway with me? I am pretty sure I can't come up with a feeling to describe my overwhelming sense of gratitude, humility and unworthiness. This will be our first trip alone without our kids since D day. My past actions easily could have cost us a different narrative. Triggers and reminders seem to lurk underneath the surface, yet here we are, forging ahead.

What will the weekend hold for us?

We will attempt to amend and rewrite the script of our story. Some parts of our story burn like a black sharpie scribbled all over a page. Other parts are mending and seem to be not so heavy. Pain and grace are mysterious like that.

Another thing heavy on my heart as we sit on a plane, trying to rebuild our relationship, is that our best friend at home begins her first chemo therapy treatment in exactly one hour. If you're like me, infidelity has awakened your sensitivity to pain. I'm betting you are quick to notice and see it all around you now.

Pain is everywhere.
But so is grace.

If you are reading this today, I hope you know that you aren't alone in your story. I feel a heaviness and a joy. Perhaps this is what CS Lewis was speaking into when he wrote the Four Loves and said this:

"Grace substitutes a full, childlike and delighted acceptance of our need, a joy in total dependence. The good man is sorry for the sins which have increased his need. He is not entirely sorry for the fresh need they have produced."

Here's to rebuilding,
Elizabeth