Ten years ago today I went on a date with a girl. I was in charge of what we were going to do and where we were going to go. I put on some jeans and a brown shirt with a guitar on it, at 19 years old I thought I looked cool. Of course I knew nothing about music and certainly couldn’t play a guitar, I probably wouldn’t be able to hold one properly but I felt good.
My date showed up late and got lost, she couldn’t find the apartment building I lived at with my Dad despite it being a giant brown High Rise. She was wearing sweatpants and a shirt no makeup, no “dolling up” which was fine by me. A girl had actually said yes to a date to with me and not to mention she had caught the eye of several people I knew, I was going a date with a cool and pretty girl!
I wasn’t as nervous as I thought I was going to be, we had talked for hours online. First on Myspace and then on AIM when those were both still things.
I chose the perfect place to eat, the Wild Buffalo Grill.
The Wild Buffalo Grill was exactly as you may have pictured, dark, dingy, weird colors and trashy. But it was Wing Wednesday! I got myself a plate of those wings and cheese fries, she got herself a burger and we went to town eating and talking. I thought it went well.
After going to the rest room to clean the chicken grease, cheese and ranch dressing off my face and fingers we headed out. Not knowing anything else to do we ended up back at my house.
We went inside and she met my Father who was sitting on his bed which also served as the couch in the living room.
I took her back to the only bed room in the place, which was mine.
We crammed in together on my mattress which sat on a broken box spring on the floor, there was no real bedding either.
She politely informed me, “That there will be no funny business” then suggested we watch a movie.
I went out and looked at the movies my Dad and I owned none of which seemed like good date movies, I listed them to her and to my surprise she chose, “Fargo”. I pulled out my VCR ignoring any feeling that it might be ridiculous that I still own a VCR and popped in my VHS version of Fargo. We watched the movie and then towards the middle of it she asked if I had anything to drink.
I quickly went to the kitchen and looked in our fridge which was empty, I grabbed some Crystal Light out of the cabinet and poured the contents into a glass with some water. I stirred vigorously to prepare her Fruit Punch Crystal Light, I didn’t want to keep my date waiting. I came back with red stains on my hands and handed her the beverage which she politely drank.
After the movie, she saw my PlayStation 2 and asked if I had any games we could play. All I had was sports games and some awful game called Mojo that my Mother had purchased for me that I had never opened.
She said she would like to play it so we did and surprisingly had ourselves a good time.
However in mid-conversation she randomly announced she had to leave, wondering if I had done something wrong I came up with the perfect solution. After I take her to her car I was going to go for a kiss…on the cheek.
When we reached the car, I gave her an awkwardly long hug, I kept holding on because I knew when I let go I had to go for a kiss. When I finally let go I went for it! I planted a kiss right on her cheek. However right afterwards I noticed she had leaned in too. So I quickly went in again and this time I gave her a kiss on the lips or more like she gave ME a kiss on the lips and boy was it a kiss. I had no idea what one Earth I was doing but I liked it.
We parted ways and later when we talked she told me we should take things slow and not rush it.
Three months later she agreed to marry me.
Later she told me that on the date she loved that I was myself and took her to a place that I loved to eat and that there was no fakeness or judgment. That is also why she showed up in her sweatpants and no makeup, she wanted me to see her as she was, the true Jane.
We fell in love fast as you can tell and throughout the years we love telling the story of our best/worst first date.
The past ten years have been the best years of my life. Before I met her I never had a true girlfriend and didn’t have any real direction in my life. I know it’s a cliché but I truly feel like Jane completes me.
I know God put us together. We have so many connections, we both grew up liking the same things and going to the same places. Even these little obscure things that no one even remembers from our town we remembered loving as a kid.
It was like our hearts grew up together.
God knew we needed each other. We both have gone through similar things and have similar problems that we can help each other with.
Jane has been a huge help in my life and often times when I pray I tell God she is my “Peter” because she is my “Rock” and the person I count on the most.
Which is why I have to Thank God in this post because without Him I wouldn’t have known her and He has helped us so much.
I know this because we have had our share of problems and had a lot of dark times and moments but God was with us even if we weren’t with Him.
Sometimes we may have wanted to abandon the ship but God was in charge of the boat and He lead is through the storm even if we didn’t realize it was Him.
My faith has grown stronger over the years and Jane who was agnostic when we met has become a Christian.
God was there for us even when we were weak and didn’t trust in Him and He is still there for us now.
Thank you God for Jane, my wife and I can’t believe it’s already been ten years.
I pray for many more with her.
I hope everyone has a blessed week,
Chris
The Good Word 