Monday, August 27, 2012

It's official. I'm a Freiberg.

It's been almost 3 months since we said I do. The flowers and cake are long gone. The move has been made. Thank you notes have been written tackled slowly due to circumstance (please forgive me, I'm embarrassed beyond measure). Lives have been merged. Last names have remained the same. Until this past weekend.

After 3 attempts at the local DMV, I am successfully a Freiberg. And if I'm 100% transparent with you, my hands were a hot, sweaty mess each and every time I attempted what seemed to be the impossible task. Part of my nervousness grew out of the fact that I kept getting it wrong. I'd go to the wrong location or I'd bring the wrong documents even though I had called ahead, thus feeling like I was set up for failure.

However the biggest gut checker was simply changing my name. I love my husband with all of my heart, please hear that loud and clear. I am so proud to join his family and gain sisters, a mother and father in law, etc... It's just that I also love being a Meyers. For 33 years, that is all I've known. To me, being a Meyers means so much more than the word you use to hold a reservation or what's monogrammed on your pillow case. It means being a hard worker, giving up what you might like to have so your kids can follow their dreams, getting a strong education, being whatever you want to be and are willing to strive for, being generous without always asking why or what's in it for me. It means spending time with family who are also friends, it means being the kind of woman who has 2 heart attacks in a few month span and still cooks for everyone while also volunteering weekly and still scrubbing your floor on your hands and knees. It means moving to China, or to the East Coast to sink or swim on your own, and it means always passing dinner dishes clockwise, and playing Spoons until it hurts.

As I handed over my South Carolina drivers license for the last time, I thought I might cry. It felt so final. So sudden (apparently almost 3 months is not enough time for me). So life altering. And although I knew it didn't mean that I never lived anywhere but Rockford, IL, it certainly felt like it in that moment. I hated that a random man behind a counter could just take away my SC license. My proof that I had, in fact, moved away on my own and created a life elsewhere.

With a few days behind the name change now, and my sweaty palms almost completely dry, I am realizing that I still get to be all of those things that Meyers means. I still am a Meyers in my flesh and bones, BUT now I get to grow to also encompass what being a Freiberg means. And although I have a lot to learn, I can already tell that being a Freiberg means also getting a strong education, being what you aspire to be with a team of family cheerleaders behind you, loving and making family a priority regardless of distance, sharing laughs and rhubarb slushes on a summer night, watching little people with big personalities grow before your very eyes, Freibergapaloozas, and taking countless pictures to capture perfect memories.

I still have a lot to learn about this marriage thing, but I'm dedicated to taking it one day at a time and facing our new journey together with the confidence of a Meyers Freiberg. And that, my friends, is double whammy!

1 comment:

hmgarver421 said...

Congrats, my friend. It is an adventure. Every. Single. Day. <3