The Love Story

So here is our love story: David and I went to school together since sixth grade. We did not hang out much but had the same homeroom all the way through High School. So I saw him on a regular basis when he was there! We graduated, went our separate ways, found each other again in 2009, he moved across the U.S. to be with me, and we lived happily ever after until 2020. Sounds so easy, huh? As if…lol

We reconnected in 2008 on Classmates.com. We started talking and during one of our conversations he mentioned he was coming back to Texas. He was currently living in Oregon and the company he worked for was closing so he wanted to see his parents and kids while checking out the job market. I told him it would be great to see him and if he had time maybe we could have dinner and catch up on life. We planned dinner for the day after he arrived.

Rewind just a moment: My family and friends thought it was odd that I didn’t date much and would ask me what it would take? I would jokingly say one day Mr. Right will ring my doorbell and I will open the door and the rest will be history! So my mom was convinced I would end up with the postman!! Lol But it wasn’t the postman and when I answered the door it wasn’t love at first sight either. But David looked nice in his jacket and blue jeans carrying a bottle of red wine. It was GREAT wine so maybe it was love at first sight, with the wine anyway!!

He wanted Mexican food (the kind you can only get in Texas: TexMex) so I took him to Antonio’s. It was so comfortable and enjoyable that we did not want the evening to end. So I drove around Burleson showing him all the changes to all the places we all used to party. We drove and talked and drove and talked until it was late. We parted ways and decided to get together again in the few weeks he would be visiting.

I started thinking what a great guy he was but he lived so far away it wasn’t really a possibility to be together. He extended his trip for another week and that made me happy but only prolonged the inevitable goodbye. I drove him to the airport without a lot of conversation, only sadness. I parked in the parking garage and it was the longest goodbye I had ever experienced. When he finally walked toward the terminal I just sat there in the car not knowing what to do. I decided to turn on the radio as I was leaving and of all songs that could have come on it had to be “When a Man Loves a Woman” and I got teary-eyed. I pulled out of the parking garage and headed home. I was on Airport Freeway when my phone rang and I saw it was David. My heart skipped a beat and I got excited that maybe he missed his flight! So I pulled over into the Chicken Express parking lot to turn around. But he hadn’t missed his flight, he just called to hear my voice and to tell me goodbye one more time. I hung up and did cry that time, it was a long ride home.

I spent the next few weeks working on my Bachelor’s degree and pretty much moping. He called several times a day and we texted every chance we got. I remember I would be right in the middle of schoolwork and lose my focus, flipping on some music with sappy songs and thinking about David. One song in particular came on a lot, Nickleback’s “Faraway” and I listened to it non-stop. Side note: I was going to make it our love song but David’s intense dislike of Nickleback made me reconsider…lol

So after about two weeks David called to tell me he was thinking of moving back to Texas. By this time I was pretty smitten which is not like me. I might fall deep into like but never in love, always casual. I asked him when he was thinking and he said in the middle of March. I was quiet for a moment and then did something I never would have done in my right mind. I told him I was flying up there to help him move! What I wanted to say was I’m flying up there to make sure you DO move back but that was a little forward. David is a man of little words so I wasn’t sure how he felt about me yet. And that is exactly what I did, to the shock of my family and friends I flew to Oregon to oversee David moving back!

So this is where the great love story takes a detour down a dark, rainy path. I get to Oregon and I am sooo happy, I rearranged the U-Haul so everything fits, we did some sightseeing and drank some great, local beer. I make a note of how natural everyone looks, women don’t really worry much about their hair or makeup. How nice would that be? Yes I was so very happy, for a day…

It rains in Oregon, every day all day in Spring!! One constant drizzle of rain, just enough to make you wet and miserable. So my plan was to stay out of said rain as much as possible but that isn’t how this love story goes.

The first thing that happened was the car hauler David hired never showed up so we had to scramble to find another. This guy could only take two vehicles so we had to haul the Z behind the U-Haul. This meant we were delayed a day of travel. This also meant we had to go through a big, wet field to get the trailer to hook up to haul back to the storage place to load up the Z. I was not happy but did the best I could to pretend that wet clothes, wet hair and wet shoes were my thing. Until I walked into the office of U-Haul, the attendant took one look at my face and he said “Honey, you need to go check yourself (finger snap and everything.) He then pointed to the bathroom and shooed me in there. And then I saw why women don’t worry about hair and makeup: my hair was matted to my head and my mascara had run clear down to my chin!! It was horrible. And if I wasn’t having enough fun, my daughter calls to tell me that my mother is concerned about my behavior, taking off across the country like that, and was wondering if David turned out to be a serial killer since she hadn’t heard from me. Yes, she was subtle…NOT!

So late that night (yes I am still wearing wet clothes) we finally meet up with the car hauler to pick up the other two vehicles. Surprisingly it is still raining (eye roll) but the truck driver seems to have picked up on the fact I am probably a tourist and let me sit in his warm truck. This gives me too much time to think about my future. Was it all worth it? This was not the plan.

On the way to the hotel, David informs we will leave in the morning right after we pick up his dog. What dog? And I didn’t think it was legal or safe for a dog to ride in the back of a U-Haul. Well it isn’t, David’s plan was for said dog to ride up front with us. And oh by the way, he will have to sit in the big seat and I would have to sit in the little seat in the middle so the dog doesn’t climb in his lap. I’m done!! This was not going to work out. I decided in the morning I would tell David I couldn’t do this and needed to fly home.

The next morning we loaded up in the U-Haul and David went in to settle the bill. He was taking forever and ever so I finally texted him. He said they had a continental breakfast so he would be a little longer. I was furious, is he seriously sitting in there enjoying breakfast while I am waiting in the truck? I believed then I had made the right decision to leave. When he finally arrived at the truck I was going to let him have it but I noticed he had some bananas in his hand. He opened the truck door and said, “Sorry it took so long. After I paid the bill I saw there was breakfast and I was going to grab some pastries and fruit. I remembered your favorite fruit was bananas so I asked if they had anymore. It took me so long because I was waiting for fresh bananas to bring you.” I was shocked, he remembered my favorite fruit was bananas? When I mentioned this he said he also remembered my favorite color is purple and I love the rain. Well until now he said. That made me laugh. And as I stared at the bananas in his hand I could see myself spending the rest of my life with someone that would stop in the middle of one of the most difficult times in his life to take care of me. And here I was ready to bail, I certainly wasn’t worthy of him. And that is when I realized I was in love with him, I was in love with him during our few weeks together, I was in love with him during sappy love songs study time, I was in love with him when I dropped him at the airport, and I was in love with him now.

The ride home was pretty uneventful, I was crazy about the dog (Jack) too and I didn’t wear makeup or fix my hair. And David told me I was even more beautiful that way. And the rest is history. A very short history but worth every tear, smile, and milestone we made. And I am so very thankful for the time we had together and that I did not bail.

This might not be the love story you were expecting but it is ours and I love it. And here’s the super cool thing about it. I mentioned we were always in homeroom together but I didn’t mention we were in the yearbook together too. Yep, our last names both started with a J. We sat one night and looked at our pictures side by side and it struck me that he has always been by my side where he belonged. I also found a picture my Grandfather took at our graduation so many years ago and there he is, walking with me to our future lives. My grandfather never knew he snapped a picture of me and the man that would be my husband so many years later. But God knew even then what was going to happen. And I am so very glad it did 🙂