Good Things

Ever wish there was a program that could take your thoughts and put them in a blog post? (At your discretion OF COURSE!)

Sometimes I do. My best posts come to me just as I’m falling asleep or while I’m brushing my teeth or when I’m in the car with my children sleeping in the back seat and it’s quiet enough to think. Unfortunately for you (and me sometimes) most of them never make it on here.

Here’s what I thought of today:

Good things come to those who wait.

Deep, I know. Just wait.

I’ve been the recipient of a great number of “good things”. Many of them have come easily to me. Most of them actually. I’m a little paranoid by nature and am always kind of waiting for the other shoe to fall. It hasn’t yet, not to say it won’t, but it hasn’t yet. My life could be summed up with the words, “It’s a good life (borderline wonderful ) (Get to the point, I know)

One of those Good Things is my husband. ‘Wait?!’ you say? I know, you’re doing the math – I’m 30, I’ve been married for 10 years, I was 20 when I got married. That’s waiting? Yeah, kind of.

I didn’t date like most people. It’s not like I wasn’t allowed to, my parents (mom, actually) told me from the time that I could remember this list of things:

• Whatever money I saved each year – they’d match (I never put that to use. Can you believe it?)
• I couldn’t get my license until I was 17.
• I couldn’t ride in the car with a driver less than 17.
• No R-rated movies.
• They’d split the cost of a car with me and pay my insurance. (Never put that to use either. Well, they DID pay the insurance, but dad was out of town like 40 or 50% of the time. I got his car See, things came easy.)
• I couldn’t date until I was 15. For whatever reason, the boys could date a year earlier but I digress.

I’m sure there was more, but those are the ones that stick out. Anyway, my point being I could’ve dated. I just didn’t. Now it’s not like the guys were lining themselves up at the door either, don’t get me wrong, and I did have a VERY intense long-standing crush throughout my junior year and some of my senior year that never amounted to anything. But -thankfully, in retrospect – the moment that a friendship or an aquaintance would turn the least bit romantic I got that feeling in my stomach. That uncomfortable I-don’t-want-this-to-go-on kind of feeling. All that to say, I didn’t date until I was 17, almost 18 actually. So….(this would all be so much clearer if it had written itself while I was in the shower this morning, when the thought came to me), THAT is what I mean by waiting, and this brings me to my husband. My very first boyfriend. My first date. My Good Thing, if you will. (I will, thank you.)

All that not dating didn’t really bother me too much. I had great friends at church that also weren’t dating that much and they kept me busy enough that I didn’t really stress about it. This not-dating gave me plenty of free time to concentrate on my studies and college applications obsess about guys and weekends and go on Bible Bowl trips and all that stuff.

I was friends with Jason’s sister. She was a couple of years younger than me, but always went to devos and camp and her boyfriend (husband now) was the same age as me, so we saw a lot of each other. The fall of my senior year, she started to mention stuff about her brother. Casually. I was clueless but honestly, he had graduated when I was a freshman, he was a really cute football-player type who hung out with all the wrong people and, from my point of view, the type of person who’d never be interested in someone like me. I never even entertained the idea of dating someone like that. Less because I was “too good” and more because I was probably “too boring”. And I was head-over-heels for someone else at the time so I noticed little else.

[Sidenote: I can't believe I've not written this down before, sadly, I'm starting to forget some of the details.]

Anyway, another mutual friend started telling me that he was asking about me too. Okay. Cool. (Aaah!) Then, much to his buddies chagrin, he started showing up at all our fun high-schooler activities. He drug his poor friends to our youth group lock-in (I know they loved that) and came and ate dinner with all of us at Chili’s. And he started calling.

You might think that this would have freaked my parents out. College guy, “wrong crowd” (you know how mom’s talk – it’s all good now ), wooing young daughter who’s about to graduate and needs to focus other things like grades & college, tying up the phone lines…

I’ll give them credit, either they were so relieved that someone was interested in me or they were genuinely happy for me (or a combination of both), that they never complained a bit. If they did, I don’t remember it. They didn’t even give me a curfew – if I didn’t complain about being tired the next day. Now that I have children of my own, I don’t know where they found that trust…or peace of mind.

Anyway, he started calling. After a couple of calls riddled with awkward pauses and “ummms” and niceties, we started actually talking.

And talking.

And talking.

All. the. time.

We started talking right after Halloween, I think, and had our first date on November 21st. Then we pretty much had the whole Christmas vacation to spend together. I ramble on all this time to say that we had a lot of time to get to know each other. We spent time together EVERY DAY. My parents could have put the brakes on it and said we were getting too close and spending too much time together. But they never did. We got to see each other almost every day for the 2 1/2 years we dated until we married. And we were able to learn so much about each other. It was such a special time, so much fun, such great memories

In trying to remember all the details to this looooong tale, that is honestly more for me than it is for you , I found this I had written in a book of notes I kept with a friend:

“My mom gave me a card today. It said, ‘I’m happy that you and Jason are “keeping company” and that you are happy. Be open and wise and remember that good things come to those who wait.’

Reading that gave me goose bumps because I found it after I’d typed about half of this. I don’t know where that card is, I could probably find it if I had someone to keep the kids busy for an hour, but it reminds me that my mom trusted me and she and I had a good relationship and that she was thinking of who I was going to be – today. I honestly don’t think she said that because she was worried I was going to sleep with him and she wanted me to wait. She knew me better than that. I think she saw a real future in him, and knew that he was a Good Thing.

I’ll spare you the rest of our story. It is, afterall, our story – one of my dearest stories. You already know the gist: boy-girl meet, fall in love, date for a bit, realize what love is like once the “like” fades a bit, get married, grow up, have a couple of kids….you know. (we’ve not bought a mini-van. yet.)

But I’ve gone on this long to say that sometimes things happen for a reason. I don’t look back and regret my boyfriend-less years. I don’t feel like I “missed out”. I feel like one of the lucky ones and I like to think that he was an answer to the prayers of my parents and I that of his, but that information is not mine to know at this point.

Our relationship is far from the perfect-couple-twirling-about-in-a-meadow happy love story that you see in perfume commercials. We bicker and complain and nag. We’re too tired and too grumpy and snippy. We’re selfish and we keep score. We snap at each other in front of the kids.

But we also hug and hold hands. He’ll still squeeze my hand 3 times in a silent “I love you”. We talk and we dream. We play with our kids and are still amazed at what cute little people are a product of our relationship. He provides, I keep the house. (or try to, at least). It works.

I thank God for every day that I’ve had and will have with my husband, my friend…my love. He’s not the type to surprise me with jewelry or flowers “just because”. But I always know he cares and how much he cares and on more than one occasion, he’s spent his Christmas or birthday money on something he knew I’d love, but would never buy. He isn’t the type who will leave comments on my blog. He isn’t the type who will ever “guest blog”. But he reads it all the time, he’s glad that I do it. He’s not the type to trounce around all of the stores to help me find the. perfect. black. pants. But he tells me how nice I look once I find them. He’s not the type to arrange for a sitter just so I can be alone. But he puts our sweet Ben to bed every night (and that can easily take an hour or more) and doesn’t complain (too much) when the house is a wreck and his clothes aren’t clean.

And I don’t really need any of those other things. I just. need. him. We’re not perfect. But I think we might just be perfect for each other.

And I love him so.

Happy Ten, Jason!

Thank you for all you do, for all you’ve done, and all you will ever do while we are privileged enough to keep one another’s company. And please,

“Grow old along with me, the best is yet to be”
-Browning