Encouragement to my Brothers about life after college, marriage and community.

I feel that is my responsibility to share some words with you to encourage you about how beautiful life is after school, as scary as it might seem, through my experience and what I am going through right now.

This place called Covington Louisiana is one exceptional hidden gem that gives me faith in finding love and community wherever we end up moving. We are blessed to be surrounded by some amazing families that just want to love us and give us advice and support at all times. Yes a lot of the families are pre-established through Rachel growing up down here, but a lot of it is starting to form naturally through people that we interact with daily either through our restaurants or in our neighborhoods. I personally am establishing relationships with people my age some but even more so with adults in the community. It is blowing me away how much respect they give and how interested they are in our life and our plans and our marriage. I am becoming friends with three couples that live in our neighborhood( which is the equivalent to a garden district) two of which are in there early 40's and the other mid to late 30's it seems, and two having no kids and the other having one girl. Very intriguing people. Two of them are our neighbors, one owning an incredible coffee shop in Madisonville who are going to let us help out to learn how they run it since we are considering and desiring to own one one day, and the other is a couple who works out of home in which the guy is a writer for the NY Post. The third couple work out of home as well and are very free spirited individuals with self expression.
I am also getting to know regulars in a coffee shop right by us in downtown Covington called St. Johns. It is a great feeling to be able to have the same feeling walking in there that I had in Ruston walking into any coffee shop. Also we are starting to hang out with a group of people from Baton Rouge that help us feel connected to like minded people again which is a great feeling.

Also, of course, I have to throw in a few words about marriage. Marriage is incredible. To be able to live out life with your favorite person is priceless. To be able to wake up and make coffee and breakfast for your wife is priceless. To be able to have people over at your house and entertain and provide love to people at all times is priceless. To have a wife who absolutely loves people and interaction and taking care of people at our house is absolutely priceless. Being able to work through money management and house keeping and organizing and life plans and trips is priceless. Having a wife who loves family, who loves my family is priceless. Having a wife who's family I absolutely adore and who absolutely adores me is priceless. Marriage is priceless.

I hope these words have been an encouragement to you all. I will definitely keep sharing as we make plans and continue to experience God in multiple ways and through many different people.

with love
Matt