I feel so undeserving. All around me, people are searching for love. I just finished watching an episode of the Bachelorette in which Des is searching for true love. And then a commercial pops up advertising e-harmony where you might find your match. Sitting on my desk is a book called "La Boda" which means "The Wedding", where a female lawyer tries to find love in Hollywood. And it feels like everywhere I turn, friends and authors seek to find someone who can complete them.
So here goes. I'm going to write a romance novel....inspired by the guy in my life. It is, of course, completely fictional and not based upon real life in the least. :P But I hope it shows just a little bit how happy he makes me and how blessed I am that God would bring him into my life and let him love me.
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Alicia lay there in her back yard. How have 23 years flown by so fast and yet so agonizingly slow? The grass tickles her toes and she sighs, realizing it's time to repaint her shrimp-pink toenail polish. But that can come later. For now, it's Saturday and she's laying in the grass, her arms up behind her head, and she's looking up at the sky. Suddenly she's a kid again, picking out a train, a giant with a club, and a celestial city in the clouds. So many memories here in this small, old home. How many times has she fallen onto this grass, angry after a fight, crying out to God in times of doubt, praying late at night and looking up at the stars, petting the dog even though she claimed to always hate it, and sneaking out for late-night walks in the cemetery when she just needed to get away. This house, this street, this grass - it's nothing spectacular. But her feet have traced a pathway through them for the last 23 years. And through all 23 years, she has grown closer to God while feeling that natural urge to search for someone without a face, without a name.....but someone that she can someday look at and call home.
When she was in elementary her dad didn't have much time for her. So she loved to hang out with the high school boys and she had crushes on Leedee and Mark. They would give her suckers and chocolate-covered granola bars and her sisters were always telling her not to sit with the boys. Trouble from the start. :P
When Alicia got into middle-school, her parents will tell you that she hit a rebellious streak. To be honest, she just wanted attention. She was the baby of the family and wasn't expected to do much besides follow in her older siblings' shadows. From observation, she learned that her older sister's got the most attention when they dressed a certain way. It didn't matter if her Dad was working late or working at home; he was always telling them to go upstairs and change. They were always so mad at him, but he spent plenty of time with them convincing them he knew better. Selfishly, she was tired of being over-looked. She gradually felt that if she was truly attractive, her dad would always be telling her to go change her outfit. If he didn't ask her to change, it must mean she looked butt ugly. So she began borrowing her sister's clothing and began hanging out with a girl named Nikki who was always getting sent to the principal's office. Nikki was pretty and she swore and had slits in her skirts and had a single mom. She was cool.
High school was rough, as you can imagine. Alicia was searching for love and attention in all the wrong places. In 7th grade she had a huge crush on an older guy named Joe and he didn't give her the time of day. Her family was pretty poor, her dad was a teacher at her school and always seemed to be around, and she always wore the same long black velvet skirt because her dad didn't like any of her other outfits. Any time she was home, she was working or practicing hours on instruments every day. She hated it. She was miserable. The only time she enjoyed was when she could hang out with her friend Nikki at church and try to feel normal. "Normal" was still pretty messed up in the seventh grade. Two hormonal girls just discovering their sexuality and wanting attention - not a good combination. In this school, everything was in the extreme. You were either a chaste virgin who dressed as conservatively as possible, or you pushed the line on everything and you were willing to go all the way. Alicia was pretty naïve. She didn't know what she wanted, but she was willing to give whatever she needed in order to distance herself from her parents and feel normal and accepted. She was looking for love in all the wrong places. Nikki told her that she should give up on Joe and that he was a jerk. She said Alicia should instead hook up with Patrick, because he had paid her $100 to get Alicia to go on a date with him. Looking back, she realizes that the guys she flirted with had completely wrong intentions and it's probably good she went to a freaking conservative school. Somehow she ended up getting pulled into a dark room with a guy named William --another one of Nikki's ideas. Alicia didn't even like him; she just liked the attention. She liked being with someone who wanted her. Anyways, he didn't even kiss her; he pulled her into that room three times to just hold her and feel her up a little. But once word got out, she got suspended and literally grounded for a year. This certainly wasn't the love she had been seeking.
Grounding must have done Alicia some good because she finally got her attention back on God. She ended up becoming best friends with Kim and Megan who, while immature, had hearts that just wanted to have fun and grow closer to God. Kim stayed with her through the years, the churches, the schools, and the boys. She was always the one to talk to Alicia about everything for hours and every conversation led back to growing more like Christ. Because of Kim, Alicia began to see that her heavenly Father was not the same as her earthly Father. Her heavenly Father always loved so much every day. A relationship with God was unlike any other. Her high school years were mostly spent realizing that God was the most important love-relationship she would ever have.
She first realized that boys noticed her when she traveled to Colorado with her youth group. They were assisting with a VBS and Michael, the cutest boy in the church starting following her around. Alicia was so rattled she couldn't even finish conversations with him. She would just walk away mid-conversation.
Then camp happened...This particular Christian camp was just a cess-pool of hormones. Tim happened. What an idiot. They emailed for a few months and she wasn't serious about him. His grammar was awful. After a receiving a few poorly re-written Romeo letters, she moved on. The misguided search continued.
And then age 16 rolled around. And with that, her body started changing. She was a bridesmaid in two weddings and suddenly her brother's friends were seeing her differently. Needless to say it was all very immature, but Alicia was convinced that at age 16 she had met the love of her life. They snuck around school sneaking touches and holding hands. But when she looked at him, she could never ever imagine wanting to marry him. She wouldn't let him kiss her. And when he looked at her and asked her to wait for him in college, she couldn't do it. The chemistry was real, but the person and the time was all wrong. She wasn't into the whole commitment thing.
Alicia headed into the workforce at age 17, confident that she knew where her life was going. She worked and finished her senior year, once again hanging out with older guys but finally realizing some discernment. She was still pretty naïve, though, and while she thought she was just being friendly she was sending all the wrong signals. During this year, she got asked out a lot, aggressively, by a lot of older men. Thankfully, it would have been illegal to say yes. Somehow, one guy stuck. He was 26, the security guard, and married. She still doesn't know why, but she went down a really dangerous and stupid road with him. Looking back she realizes he could have gotten in trouble for the things he said to her. Even though she didn't respond, he continued to call her, text her, email her, bother her into her freshman year of college until Alicia finally went to one of her friends Liz with the problem. Liz answered the phone for Alicia and told him to stop bothering her and to go be with his wife. He finally got the picture and left her alone.
As a freshman in college Alicia was confident she would meet the love of her life the minute she stepped foot on campus. In fact, as she unpacked her things in her room, she had no doubt she would be dating within a couple weeks. But God totally didn't see things that way. She doesn't know exactly what happened. Call it hormones, call it trying a new "Asian" medicine that her Korean boss gave her, call it stress, but over that first semester her face broke out to the point that she didn't even recognize herself in the mirror anymore. It completely shattered her. She didn't feel like a person of worth anymore. She certainly didn't feel desirable and beautiful. She felt like something from yesterday. Someone who, at age 18, needed to say goodbye to outward beauty. It was a truly hard time. She was away from her family and didn't know what to do. The only person to turn to was God. She couldn't imagine anyone ever again looking at her and saying that she was beautiful. But she decided that she was going to focus on internal beauty. She was going to still smile and she was going to try to grow closer to God, more than anything. At the end of the day, love from a lot of men didn't matter. It had to be all about the love of Christ.
Then at age 19, Frank came into her life. He was 6'3" and the life of the party. Funny guy and a truly good guy. She never even saw him "like that" until one of her brother's friends declare they had chemistry after hearing them argue. She wishes she had never heard that comment, because she truly never found chemistry with the guy. And after a year, him saying he wanted to marry her, and a love-less first-kiss on Lake Michigan, she did the hardest thing she's ever done. She broke up with her best friend. That sucked.
She went out with a lot of guys. Honestly, she can't even remember all of their names. A lot of them she doesn't want to remember. Time after time after time. Excitement over a new guy, several dates, and then his flaws come out. And Kim, bless her heart, got excited with her for each and every guy. She listened. And when they broke up, she comforted her and never said that she told her so. She was a true friend.
Alicia sat out of school and continued this vicious cycle of meeting a guy, saying yes, and breaking up with him within a couple weeks. She found a time period where she wasn't working or going to church with any guys her age other than her brothers dumb friend. Out of boredom, she joined dating websites. And with that, she only cemented her constant search for love in all the wrong places. She felt that she need to always be meeting someone or she might miss God's will. There was Adam, and Nate, Jared and Adam, and so many other guys it's too hard and too embarrassing to remember.
But with about 99% of all these relationships, Alicia would end it before it got too serious and before it got physical. So while she did date a lot of guys, not very many of them got very far with her. She certainly never let anyone to second or third base. She didn't make out with any of them. She barely went on a fourth date with any of them.
I say all of this to say that she didn't even know what she was looking for. She didn't know what her type was. She didn't know whether he needed to be rich or funny or tall or short. Alicia just knew that she wanted to meet the God-honoring guy who would make her fall in love with him and would make her stick around for the long haul. ;)
And then she met a guy named Andrew. He infuriates her, excites her, makes her laugh, makes her cry, and makes her keep coming back for more. The first time she saw him differently, she was sitting across from him at an Olive Garden table. They both casually said they weren't seriously dating anyone, they were just "seeing where things led". So super casual - so cool of them. They were so noncommittal and not tied down. Suddenly they're making out on the couch, in the back of his truck, on her bed, in the department store dressing room, everywhere they can. And then he stops touching her and says, "I want more than this." And Alicia's like, "What the heck? What more could you want?" Turns out he wants a freaking relationship.
Time after time, their relationship should have been doomed. And somehow God gives them grace to forgive each other. Honestly, their relationship should have stayed shallow and selfish. But God gave them the chance to look beyond the physical and see deeply into each other. She grew to love the person that he is--the good AND the bad. So often, they could have dated other people. But God closed those doors and opened this strange and unpredictable one.
She looks at him and loves and hates and likes and wants him all at once. He looks back at her and adores and desires and loves and teases her all at once. Somehow, love is no longer about a search for the right person. It's not a search for a better person. It's a journey to dying to self and a beautiful discovery of who he is. It's an inability to control the other person and a resigning to loving them even with their flaws glaring right out in the open. It's praying together and being vulnerable together. It's finally looking into someone's eyes and still being herself but finally finding someone who helps her be ready for commitment. It's skin on skin, passion that is reigned in only because of respect and a desire to honor God in the bounds of marriage. It's him saying he wants to do the right thing by her and her giving herself to him 100%.
It's rare. It's pure. It's scary. It's beautiful.
She lays there in the grass. 23 years old. So flawed. So imperfect. So undeserving. So in love with God and so afraid to say she has finally stopped searching. So hopeful that this is forever. So sure that if God would allow it and the man she loves would want it, she would spend the rest of her life making him fall in love with her every day.
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