🕊️ The Speech I Didn’t Give at My Daughter’s Wedding

This past weekend, our youngest daughter, Gabby, got married.

It was beautiful. Wild and wonderful. A flurry of flowers, family, and a thousand tiny logistics—but more than anything, it was deeply moving. A sacred moment when two young people stood before God and said yes to forever. I’m grateful for every bit of it.

I’m still recovering from the devastating sweetness of my granddaughters who ROCKED IT as Gabby’s flower girls.

Now, one thing you may not know about being the mother of the bride is that…no one asks you to give a speech. No toast, no mic, no standing awkwardly with tears running down your face while trying to say something coherent in front of a large crowd of people. And honestly? I’ve always been a little relieved about that.

But this time, I found myself thinking that I might have something to say.

Of course, I would have fallen apart emotionally and possibly ruined my mascara and Gabby’s moment in one go. But I’ve been thinking about something Gabby once said to me when she was about five years old, and now that she’s married, I keep on thinking about it. So I’ll say it here.

I was standing in the kitchen, scrolling on my phone. You know the scene. Multitasking, distracted, mentally juggling ten things while scrolling Instagram or emails or goodness-knows-what. Little Gabby came up to me and started tugging on my pant leg, saying, “Mama, Mama, Mama…”

Eyes still glued to the screen, I said, “Go ahead, sweetie, Mama’s listening.”

But she wasn’t having it.

She said, “No, Mama. I want you to listen with your eyes.”

Oof.

I still feel that one.

She was five years old and already knew something I’m still learning: being heard isn’t the same as being seen. She didn’t want part of me. She wanted all of me—attention, connection, love. She didn’t want to be a background voice while I scrolled a screen. She wanted to matter.

And don’t we all?

Every one of us is walking around with that same ache, to be seen, known, and loved. It’s our deepest longing. And I think, in many ways, it’s also our highest calling: to see, know, and love the people God places in our lives.

So this is what I would have said to Gabby and David:

Listen with your eyes.

In your marriage, in the beautiful, boring, stressful, sacred days ahead, listen with your eyes. Truly see each other. Look past the distractions, past the noise, past the endless to-do lists and parenting schedules and work deadlines. Look up.

The world will try to pull your attention in a hundred directions, and you will do many important things. But no thing—nothing—is more important than the person standing in front of you.

And that doesn’t just go for newlyweds. I need the reminder, too. We all do.

Listen with your eyes to your spouse.

Listen with your eyes to your kids.

To your coworkers. Your neighbors. The people who annoy you. The people who need you.

Even the stranger in the checkout line.

No app or task or calendar event is more important than the soul in front of you.

To love well is to see.

So no, I didn’t give a toast. But I guess this is it.

From one mother’s heart, full of love and mascara-streaked memories, to all of us just trying to love well in a noisy world…

Let’s do as my little girl once told me: Let’s listen with our eyes. 🤍