Apparently love is in the air this fall. In the past two months, I’ve attended four weddings, sang the couples love songs and watched the brides walk toward their grooms wearing big, beautiful dresses and holding big, beautiful dreams.

I like weddings for the reasons most people like weddings – a good excuse to get together in the name of celebrating a happy occasion and a fun reason to dress up and dance. But I’ve noticed as I’ve grown up in years and in my marriage, the rest of the reasons have shifted on me a bit.

Like now, instead of getting my own groove on, it’s more fun to watch my little girls spin, clap and twirl to the music, outlasting most of the adults in the room. I could watch that all night.

But more than that lately, I’ve appreciated weddings for the little reminder they spark in me. Those big beautiful dreams these couples are holding, that was us, with the world just waiting on us to make plans or make it up as we went along.

We’ve been married over 12 years now, so that familiar feeling of being 23 and carefree is fading as we wade through the muddy waters of what it actually means to be married. Like full-in, full-on married.

I was contemplating this a bit last night as I coaxed my husband up to the bedroom after finally getting our two young daughters to sleep and the dishes cleaned up from supper. He just kicked his feet up in his chair and I remembered that I just washed our bedding and, well, I could really use some help with the dang fitted sheet. Romantic.

He sighed and trudged up the stairs after me and as we stood in our room discussing our pillow preference and laundry situation, I was struck by the partnership of it all. In those big, beautiful dreams we held at our own wedding, I doubt we thought of moments like this.

Like, isn’t it just really nice to have someone in the house to help us sort out the annoying parts of the everyday grind? I mean, I can do the sheets and the dishes, the baby bath and bedtimes alone, but it’s all just better with him.

And when it comes to the tough stuff, the sad things, the grieving, the uncomfortable decisions, the worries and wondering, if I could give advice to any young person looking for love, I would shout, “Pick someone you want next to you in the trenches of life!”

Because there will be trenches. And then be prepared to be your soldier’s soldier as well.

On our way home from a wedding last weekend, I was thinking about time and how it can wear on us. I commented on when I thought I might have been in my prime, less stressed, more hopeful maybe. Younger. More beautiful.

“I think it was around 23,” I said to my husband.

“No, I think it’s right now,” he said back to me.

And I believed him. Because love is in the air, and the best times? What can we do but believe that they’re right now.

Jessie Veeder is a musician and writer living with her husband and daughters on a ranch near Watford City, N.D. She blogs at https://veederranch.com. Readers can reach her at jessieveeder@gmail.com.