I’m here at the old house in Kalamazoo, thirty minutes from Lawton. A winter storm bears down. Snow. Ice. Wind gusts that make the windows rattle.
I have two days to be out of this place I’ve called home for almost twelve years.
I ran out of boxes.
For a moment, I reached for my phone to call Lady. She’s home today. We have dozens of boxes stacked in the garage at the new house. She could bring them.
But I stopped myself.
In those five seconds, I saw it. Her car sliding on black ice. A fender bender on the highway. Or worse. The fragile thing we’re building…
this life, this family, this future – cracked open by one unnecessary risk.
I didn’t want her on these roads.
The risk felt too great.
So the boxes can wait. I’ll figure something else out. Because it’s not just me anymore.
This is what commitment looks like before the vows are even spoken.
Almost seventeen years ago, when my daughter was born, I made up a saying for myself:
The first step is a commitment. To go all the way is a promise.
I’ve repeated it thousands of times since.
When she was two and wouldn’t sleep.
When she was seven and couldn’t figure out math.
When she was thirteen and the silences stretched longer than the conversations.
Every hard moment as a parent, that line anchored me.
The first step is showing up. Going all the way is the promise you keep when no one’s watching.
In twelve days, I’m getting married.
The commitment isn’t just to Lady.
It’s to the young children I just spent five days with.
To a dog that’s become my new friend and a cat loved by that same almost-seventeen-year-old daughter.
To a house and a barn that both need new roofs.
To three acres of land that will require quiet stewardship.
When you have more, you have more to protect. More to hold. More to carry forward.
I thought I understood commitment when my daughter was born.
I thought I understood it through twelve years of 50% custody, 100% dad, never wondering where the time went because I never missed.
But this? This is different.
This is choosing her safety over my convenience in a snowstorm.
This is saying no to the easy solution because the cost, even the possibility of the cost, is too high.
The roads can stay dangerous without her on them.
This is the weight I’m choosing.
This is the promise taking shape before I ever say “I do.”
What promise are you keeping right now that no one else sees?