How It All Began

I love to hear stories about how people met.

My all-time favorite story is that of my maternal grandparents.  My Grammie loved ice skating and she was good at it.  One winter, she was skating and fell through thin ice.  Thankfully, there were others on the pond and one particular young man pulled her out of the ice and carried her to a nearby house.  That young man was my grandfather and that rescue was how they met.

Jamey and my story is not nearly so dramatic. 

I remember clearly sitting in the back seat of my grandparent's station wagon.  We had borrowed it and my parents were driving me back to college for the fall semester of my sophomore year.  The night before, my boyfriend of three years broke up with me.  I knew it was for the best.  I knew I wouldn't ever marry him, but to officially break off a relationship and friendship that had lasted so long was hard.

I was looking out the car window and these thoughts were running through my head...okay, I know most of the boys in my (college) class and while many of them are really great, I can't see dating and becoming serious with them...I guess if I'm meant to marry, it will be someone I meet at church or through my job one day.  I remember praying to God for patience and putting my love life (or lack thereof) into His hands.

Over the first couple months at school, I was surprised to find myself dating.  It was clearly what people my age did, it's just that it had been so long since I got to know a new person in that way and I found that I wasn't ready and needed to back peddle a bit to gain my footing.

Then, one evening a group of us were hanging out and one of my good friends (thank you, Jon) brought along a high school friend of his, a freshman.  He was tall, cute, unassuming and quiet.  And he was all I could think about from that day forward.

I managed to get to know him over time.  Some girlfriends would give me a heads up if he was in the campus center or cafeteria so I could "run into him".  They used to joke that when he walked into a room, his eye lashes would knock them over even if they were on the opposite side.  I spent many hours playing pool in the game room with him and his volleyball teammates.  This in itself seemed bizarre to me.  I had never been friends with jocks before.  My boyfriend of three years played guitar, was in a band and had dreadlocks.  This new young man did not.  He had short, neat hair and enjoyed exercise.  Weird.

We became good friends, but he did not catch on to the fact that I wanted to be more than that for quite a while.  Once he did and I discovered he felt the same way, life was bliss.  I have such wonderful memories of getting to know him, spending hours playing the questions game.  You know- when you ask a person all sorts of hypothetical questions about the future (in a non-commitment-threatening way) in order to find out what they are like.  I remember one session of these questions when the topic of homeschooling came up.  We discovered we both thought it was cool and would be open to homeschooling our kids one day (not kids with each other- no, no- we were playing it cool).

I remember how it felt so weird to fold my hands together (as if I was praying) during that time.  My hands felt so small because I was so used to holding his big hand in mine.  I know it's sappy and corny, but that's love.  Sappy and corny.  Three years later we married.  That was 13 years ago.

It's not a dramatic, fall-through-the-ice kind of story, but it's my very favorite one. 

I love these stories.  Did I mention that already?  Please tell me your favorite meeting story- it can be yours or someone else's.  Pretty please?  It would make my day. Pin It