I sit and look at my life and wonder how I got to be so blessed with finding my true love when I really was not looking for it almost three years ago. My boyfriend and I met completely by accident, nothing that was a “set-up”. I went to a Cinco De Mayo party with my step sister, the party was at her boyfriends dad’s house, yes I know kind of a strange place for me to attend but hey she needed me. I get there, she was so excited to see me and so thankful that I suckered myself into doing this with her. I walk into the house with her and get introduced to all the family members that I had never met before, and there was Terry. I will never forget how he looked at me, (eyes got wide, he stood up and extended his hand) when I walked through the door, walked over to him, smiled, shook his hand and said, “Nice to meet you.” The only thing that came out of his mouth was, “Yeah” (but in a polite kind of way).
I was in the kitchen with my step-sister, Terry’s step-mom and his step-sister kind of being helpful with cooking and setting things up along with helping cleaning as we went along. Finally it was dinner time, boxing was on the TV so naturally all the men were around the living room. So all of us ladies sat in the dinning room, now usually that works for me, but I was there to enjoy my time with my sister and this family I just met along with celebrating Cinco de Mayo. As I walk into the living room Terry was the first one to get up from his seat and offered it to me, I looked at him smiled and said, “Oh wow, Thanks!” deep down hoping no one really noticed how excited I was to have met a man that was still a gentleman. As the night progressed we all were laughing, talking and just having a great time that night, but for some reason Terry and I ended up in the Kitchen alone at some point. From that moment on there was nothing but pure conversation, we talked about all kinds of things: our interests, likes and dislikes, I sat there not really paying much attention to what was going on around me. All I kept thinking was, “Wow, I can’t believe this a real man not some guy who does not know who he really is, FINALLY!” We sat there talked the night away soon we realized that no one was walking thru the kitchen and then we decided well we better head out to the front, that night I realized that I’ve met my match.
Now I tell you the beginning to tell you this. You get through your first year of your relationship with all the ups and all the downs and realizing that what the two of you have is real, what is going on in the relationship, and finding that not only have you found your soul mate but really your best friend. It’s amazing.
The second year is the year every relationship hopes to get to, but I can tell you I think Terry and I put challenges of ups and downs to the letter. I mean I moved in with him six months after we started dating, we moved from his house in Missouri, then we moved to an apartment after that lease was over. We moved to a duplex back into my home state of Kansas stayed there for a bit, naturally I made the mistake of having us stay with my mother for a month. Going into almost our third year we moved again into a new place found issues with the landlords, now we are settled into a nice new home that is smaller but cheaper in rent. While all of this was going on Terry quit his job to start his own business, I quit my job to go back to school full time, still had my part time job. Lost my part time job then eventually found a new one, my car that had one year left to pay off was repossessed, so that left us with only one car to get back and forth to school, his work, my work, and back home. I’m thinking at this point most people would have thrown their hands up and thought, “Really? I can’t do this anymore.” Not us, or I thought not us. In March after my twenty-ninth birthday, Terry dropped a bomb on me, “I think we need a break” I looked at him not sure what to think or what to say at that time all I did was feel my heart drop, break, rip apart, and started thinking, “What am I going to do?” I actually started to panic for the first time in my life I think it was because I didn’t have a back up plan.
