trusting your instincts

Trusting you instincts is the "theme of the week" on my big sister's blog. Here is my submission:

My husband and I had a long history before we finally ended up together. We met through friends and had a class together in college. I was a sophomore and he was fresh out of the Marine Corps. I had a boyfriend and he had a girlfriend. We would study (flirt) together for our class and the go get pizza. It was an affair of the heart if nothing else. A year or so later, I finally dumped my deadbeat boyfriend to give my future husband a chance, since he was also single again.

So we dated for a few months and it was awesome. But it became apparent that we were both not sure what we wanted to do with our lives. We decided, amicably, to part ways. I remember sitting with him in his truck outside our favorite restaurant and saying goodbye. I was crying uncontrollably and telling him how I knew he'd be a wonderful husband and father to someone, some day. He said, no, he would probably never get married. He just couldn't see it. We said "I love you" and drove away in separate directions. It was the weirdest break-up ever.

Believe it or not, I went back to my deadbeat boyfriend and reconciled. But I knew in my heart that it was all wrong. Still, I stayed with him for two more years. During that time, I always had someone else on my mind. I would hear certain songs on the radio and try not to cry. I would drink too much at a bar, tell my boyfriend that I was going to the ladies room, and try to call him, but he was no longer there.

Then one day my loser boyfriend (do I sound bitter?) told me that he'd heard that my future husband had almost died (he was friends with my husband's old roommate). He said he'd fallen off a roof or something. I tried to play it cool. I didn't want him to see how upset I was or how interested I was in the information. Later, I had dinner with my old college roommate who had been with me though everything and had been rooting for my husband-to-be for years. I said I was still thinking about him and wondered if I should pursue it. I knew where his parents lived, but not him. She said I should send a letter. What did I have to lose?

So I did. In it, I told him all about my life and that I was about to go back to school and live on my own. I was in the middle of moving so I told him I could best be reached on a Saturday night around eight at my parents' house. I mailed it on a Friday. He called the next day. I was not expecting him to get it so quickly, so I was not there when he called. My parents forwarded his number to me. I called him back. Talking to him was so easy. It was like we'd never been apart. He kept asking me all about what I'd been up to and where I lived. I finally said, "I told you all about that in the letter already..." And he said, "What letter?"

He had not received the letter yet. He just happened to call my parents' house looking for me at the exact time I had specified in the letter. I almost dropped the phone. "Shut. up. No. way." I knew at that moment it was finally our time.

My instincts proved to be correct. As a husband and father he is wonderful, and the "someone" who got to marry him was me.