I don’t keep many pictures on my phone, but there are several of my wife that I love. One is in the morning after my wife had gone to bed with wet hair. Her hair sticks up and out in every direction, chaotically styled as her hair dried through the night. Another, a quick snapshot I took near Bell Canyon Creek, holding out her hand. A butterfly had landed gently in her palm. That scene is remarkable in its own right — that a butterfly would perch on her outstretched hand. It’s like my wife was making a safe space for the butterfly to land, and it knew it.
For as long as I’ve known her, she’s been that kind of person.
We’ve been married just about 24 years. Not every day has been perfect, of course. But she’s always been there. Present. Mostly patient. And always kind.
During these past few weeks of serious reflection, a phrase continues to come to mind: the quiet grace of a good partner.
Quiet grace is the notion that we can go through life doing small things that impact people’s lives without looking for recognition. It’s the kind of grace that folds laundry when you hadn’t noticed the basket was getting full or that makes a late-night run to the store for medicine without complaint. One that my wife excels at: sitting beside me on my low days without trying to fix them.
I think it’s easy to misunderstand this kind of grace. Especially in the early years of our married, I thought love had to show up in dramatic ways and grand gestures. Even believing that, I can’t say that I’ve shown up that way very often in our marriage. The longer we’ve been together, however, I’ve come to realize and appreciate that real love is mostly quiet. Steady. Never demanding credit.
That kind of grace doesn’t keep score or try to settle a balance. There’s no judging whether you deserve it or not. It just is.
A handful of people have shown up in my life with that kind of presence. My 12th grade English teacher — Nancy Squires — became a kind of lighthouse during my senior year. Her son passed away the year before my mother did, so we developed a surrogate bond, sometimes spending hours talking in her classroom after school or during her prep period. My wife and I even lived in her basement right after we were married. She always cheered us on.
That was more than two decades ago. She’s gone now. I still think of her when I write. In so many ways, “Aunt Nancy” is a primary reason I continue to write today.
Sometimes, I wonder how many things in my life have held together simply because good women stood quietly at the center of them: my mother, my grandmothers, my mom’s oldest sister who has been integral in my own family, my wife, Aunt Nancy, even my sister.
There’s a journal entry from years ago that still surprises me when I read it. I had made a mess of my Saturday — junk food, too much screen time, unfinished tasks, the usual — and all I wanted, I recorded, was to fold laundry and play with my youngest son.
When I think back on it, sometimes it strikes me as weird that I wanted to fold laundry. I don’t generally want to do that. Folding laundry doesn’t come with any special recognition. A simple thank you, perhaps, but nothing else. Laundry is just simple — grounding, even.
That day, my toddler son sitting on the bed babbling while I folded socks was restorative. Silly as it may sound, laundry keeps me rooted in what will always matter: my family. Whatever else may happen in life, they’ll always be my people. If you’ll pardon the pun, it’s a thread that weaves through everything.
My wife has a way of creating that kind of space for me, our kids, her friends, and often people we hardly know. She doesn’t demand attention. She just keeps showing up. Over and over. Like breathing. Like gravity.
Years ago, I served in a church leadership role that took up most of my Sundays and many weeknights. I loved the people I served. I loved the work, even when it was exhausting. There were, however, so many times when I would hit a wall — physically, spiritually, emotionally.
I would sit down on the couch and breath out some of the stress of the coming day and my wife would drop down next to me and hold my hand. We got good at twiddling our thumbs together.
Holding hands. It sounds so small. But when everything else in life feels noise or uncertain, there’s a steadiness that comes from small things.
That’s what my wife has taught me, that the real work of building something meaningful happens in the quiet, steady, repeatable, and mundane of life. Grace doesn’t always feel like sunlight breaking through the clouds. Mostly, it’s a butterfly landing quietly in your open hand.
I think back to when we were dating — even before — how drawn I was to her light, even before I had words for it. I saw something in her that I didn’t understand, and continue to marvel at today. I hope I always do.
The older I get, the more I believe that inspiration isn’t what carries us forward in the hard seasons. Regular life can’t be treated like a business where strategy and hustle can keep things going. We get through the tough seasons with someone sitting by you when you’re at your worst who focuses on your best.
That’s who my wife’s been for me.
If I’ve learned anything at all from these past weeks of reflection, it’s that climbing out of the canyon — returning to what matters — doesn’t happen alone. It happens with people like her. Like Aunt Nancy. Quiet people. Steady people. The kind of people who bring grace in ways that might not get noticed, but change everything at the same time.
If I have anything worth offering now, it’s because of the quiet grace of a good partner and other good people who have shown me how to show up in the right way for others.
I’m still learning what that looks like. Sometimes it’s biting my tongue. Sometimes it’s holding my wife’s hand. Sometimes, it’s just staying — without fixing anything.
Grace, right now, means presence over performance. Not being the hero.
Just being somewhere safe to land.
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