I first saw him almost fifteen years ago.
My family was at the local rec center; we ALL (mom, dad, brother, sister, and me) played volleyball, so we practically lived there. I was probably 11 or 12 at the time, and I was SO not interested in boys unless it was to be best friends, because then we could play Capture the Flag together or go fishing together. Or to get their hand-me-down clothes because pink was “ew” and tight clothes and dresses were “ick.”
OK. Back to the boy. I saw him while he was at volleyball practice, and I could tell he was athletic and competitive but new to the sport. His team was doing digging lines, and he made a bad dig, and kind of slapped the floor in frustration before jogging to the back of the line to go through the drill again. I'll never forget that moment. I felt this weird spark.
Call me crazy, call me a fool, but I know what I felt. It was like I instantaneously just knew in my gut that he was different from all the other boys out there, in the best way possible. I don’t know…whatever it was, it briefly seized my attention. And then I left the gym and didn’t see him again. I didn't see him again until several years later, when I started attending a certain church because the music minister, whom I've known since second grade as my piano teacher, asked me to be in the church's Easter musical.
It just so happened that this boy’s dad was the pastor of this church, and so, of course, the boy was very involved there.
Weirdly, my dad asked me if I was going to this new church for a boy, and I adamantly replied, “No!” Complete with an eye roll, I’m sure. Looking back, Dad knew something I didn’t know.
My first conversation with this amazing boy happened at the cast party for this Easter musical during the spring of my freshman year of high school (I was sporting frizzy hair, braces, zits…you know the deal). "Do you go to CLC?" he asked, wanting to know where I went to church. Unable to meet his deep, blue eyes, I responded, "No, but I used to.” Yeah, that was pretty much our first conversation. Romantic, huh?
I could write pages and pages about our relationship, but we’ll fast forward a couple years and do the Spark Notes version of this story. There was the amazing homecoming dance in 2004 where he caught me alone after youth group one Wednesday night and said that he “enjoyed my company” and felt like I “reciprocated” the feeling – yes, these were his exact words—and would I like to accompany him to homecoming?
Later I found out that the only reason he decided to ask ANYONE to the dance was because his football teammates pressured him, so THANK YOU, if you were on the JHS football team in 2004!
| Homecoming 2004 |
So, yeah, I went to homecoming with our high school quarterback, and it was SUPER amazing, and we were supposed to go to Busch Gardens sometime later that week, kind of like a date, but then we saw each other at church the next morning, and we felt all awkward and scared and didn’t know what to say to each other…so we said nothing to each other. For, like, two months. This was tough because we saw each other six days a week because of choir class and church, but somehow, we managed to avoid speaking to each other.
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| Jamaica mission trip. In this moment, I realized that I really, really liked him because of his willingness to serve. |
Next, there were the months of being stupid and immature.
After those months was the summer right before he left for college, when we were asked to sing a duet together at church. Through that encounter, we finally apologized, began talking our issues out (via AIM), and became friends. The summer before he left for college, he asked me to wait for him, and of course, I said I would. So, then August came, and he was off to college, 2000 miles away.
When he came back for Christmas break, he asked me to be his girlfriend on Christmas Eve. And literally fifteen seconds later, we shared our first kiss. And when I say “first kiss,” I mean it was my first kiss. And his first kiss.
And as we sat on my parents’ couch, with the Christmas tree lights flickering behind us, I thought life couldn’t get any more perfect.
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| New Year's Eve 2005, literally a week after we started dating! Photo credit- Lauren Collins. |
Throughout college, we dated long distance. We made our own friends and did our own thing but visited whenever it was possible. Over the four years of college, I broke up with him, and he broke up with me, and both times, our relationship grew because we did.
Now, this man has been my husband for three years. And they have literally been the best three years of my life.
I'm reminded every day of how utterly amazing he is. Like the other night, when he stayed after his baseball game to help clean up the dugout, throwing away at least twenty empty water bottles, strewn about by careless teammates.
Or this past Monday, when he cooked me eggs and pancakes for breakfast because I was exhausted from driving home from Texas on five hours of sleep.
Or every time he holds me when I cry over whatever I feel like crying about, whether it’s my grandpa dying or the crazy girl hormones at work or the fact that teaching is just plain hard sometimes. He is my rock, and he’s taught me that being strong doesn’t mean denying my feelings, and that it’s ok for me to have my big feelings.
He has taught me what it means to love and forgive unconditionally. There is nothing as scary as being completely vulnerable with someone and telling them everything about you, hoping and praying they will accept you, and he always has.
He's shown me how to laugh off the little things, like when we're running five minutes late for church or when we come home to cat barf on the carpet. Really, in the grand scheme of life, not a big deal, and he's taught me how to let these things go.
He listens to me no matter what. I can babble about going to get a manicure and all the colors of nail polish I considered, and he would never once tell me to be quiet. I can vent about my job and he will hold my hand and nod. He does not try to offer a solution unless I ask him, and I do ask often because he gives wise advice.
He demonstrates that he loves me by helping with the dishes, laundry, trash…by cooking for me when he gets home from work before I do…by watching HGTV with me sometimes, even though he hates it.
No, our love is not a fairy tale. We have hurt each other, said ugly things to each other, and folded the towels wrong (him, not me). But really, I don’t want a fairy tale. I don’t want a Nicholas Sparks love story. I don’t want the perfect relationship. I want exactly what I have with Randy.
