I failed to mention one very important thing about the time between Christmas and when I saw David again in March: I almost broke up with him. I even wrote out a really long letter about how we needed to take "a break" (yeah, like that ever works) but I never sent it and I never brought it up in our daily conversations (which had grown shorter and shorter by the day). David could tell that something was wrong and I knew he could tell but I really didn't know what to do. I didn't want to give up my relationship with David, him being my best friend and confidante, but I didn't know if I still wanted to be his girlfriend or possibly even his wife. It was a miserable time, for both of us. I had already planned my trip to Hawaii and so I resolved that if I was to break up with David, I would do it in person. (Which would have been really awkward if it happened at the beginning of my trip, but luckily, as soon as I was with David again, I knew breaking up would be a mistake.) I wish I knew why I had all these serious doubts then and several times throughout our two year relationship but I have no idea. It always seemed to be a battle between my heart and my mind. My heart was telling me that David was the one, but my mind was only focusing on all the reasons why we shouldn't be together. (I have thankfully gotten over all of those issues.)
By May, however, our relationship was as strong as ever, as I prepared to meet David's entire family in Atlanta. I flew into Atlanta on Wednesday, May 9, and David picked me up (he had arrived a few days prior) and we drove to his older sister Fiona's house to spend the night. The next day, David and I took his youngest sister Kristy with us to the Georgia Aquarium and the Martin Luther King Memorial. I was then brought to David's home to meet the future in-laws. (Talk about nerve-wracking.) David and I grew up in two very different families and environments and while I knew all that from our many conversations, it was another thing to actually witness it in person. I was definitely out of my element--I had no idea what to talk about--but his family was very welcoming and I was put at ease. It helped, of course, that everyone was preoccupied with Lorann's wedding and didn't have much time to focus on me.
Lorann and Matt were married on Friday, May 11th and that occupied our entire day. Our next three days in Atlanta were spent watching TV/movies with David's family, meeting a whole bunch of David's friends, and going through David's old stuff in the shed. We both flew back to D.C. together on Monday, May 14th and David stayed for a week. (It was our first time on a plane together. I loved getting to sleep on David's shoulder.) The majority of the week in D.C. was spent dragging David to all my favorite D.C. attractions: the National Archives, Building Museum, Portrait Gallery, American Art Museum, Chinatown, Ford's Theater, the Lincoln monument, the Holocaust Museum, DAR Museum, Library of Congress, Union Station, and the National Cathedral. We also did a bit of ring shopping and I introduced David to all my D.C. friends. On Saturday, we rented a car and drove out to Shenandoah National Park to do some hiking. It is absolutely gorgeous there.
We have a tradition in my family of buying Christmas ornaments from all the places we visit (my mom has ornaments from around the world) and so David and I started the tradition for ourselves by purchasing our first ornament together at Shenandoah.
On Sunday, I cooked wontons (I really love those things!) for all my roommates, friends, and Jacob [remember him? David's old roommate? he lives in Maryland now] to spend more time with David and to say good-bye. The next afternoon, I took David to the airport, said my tearful good-byes and returned to my lonely long-distance life. By this point, I was pretty sure that David was the one that I wanted to marry, but every so often, I would be stricken with immense doubt. To be clear, I never doubted for a second that David would be a wonderful husband and father but I did doubt myself, all the time. Was I ready to get married? Could I be a good wife to David? Was there someone better? I couldn't think of anyone better than David but at the same time, I couldn't understand why, after all this time, I didn't have an absolute certainty that David was the right choice. (For the record, that moment never came. And I don't think it comes for a lot of people. Marriage is the absolute biggest leap of faith that you will ever take. But I eventually found the faith I needed to dive right in.)
The summer passed rather quickly. I was doing an internship at a historic house in Georgetown and enjoying my summer respite from homework and papers. My parents came out to visit in July and we drove up to New Jersey to see my brother and his wife and then we all went to Palmyra for the annual Book of Mormon pageant there. I felt that my parents hadn't really embraced David yet or maybe they were just living in denial about the state of my relationship and the fact that their baby was growing up. But, while waiting for the pageant to start, my mom and I started discussing wedding plans and I tentatively set my wedding date for June 6th, which was still a whole year away. After that, I knew my mom was on board, but my dad still needed convincing.
At the end of July, David bought a condo in Hawaii. He didn't really consult me in the decision, but it seemed to do the trick with my dad. Somehow the fact that my prospective husband owned property--and in Hawaii, no less--impressed my father. Thereafter, he seemed to warm up to the idea that David was sticking around.
Near the end of August, I flew to Salt Lake to visit my sister Cassy (and mother, who was there with my sister) and meet my new nephew James who is the most adorable boy ever.
See? Adorable. He's almost two years old now, but he only gets cuter as he ages. He also looks like a 3 year old now. Anyway, Mom, Cassy, and I went to a few stores to try on wedding dresses because I figured I might as well look while I was in Utah, home of the modest wedding dress. I found a few that I liked but none that I really loved. After spending the weekend with my sister, I flew home to San Diego and met David, who had flown in from Hawaii to spend the week with me.
We spent some time with my parents and then borrowed my mother's car and drove up to Monterey to re-visit where all the magic had happened and to see the few friends we still had there, including Monica, who kindly let us crash at her place. We visited some of our favorite spots in Monterey--we even went back to the Rock of Confession and had a long conversation there about the course our relationship had taken--and played miniature golf. See, David and I had been trying to go mini golfing for like a year but Oahu's only course shut down and we never had time in Atlanta or D.C. So yes, we mini golfed.
Here we are at Lover's Point. After two days in Monterey, we drove up to San Francisco to visit my friends Tessa and Nicole. We went out to dinner and then Nicole let us sleep at her place before we headed home for San Diego the next day. It was a whirlwind trip but it was fun to go on our first road trip together (and to discover that we could spent 8 hours in a car together and not want to kill each other) and to see old friends and reminisce. David and I spent a few more days together before we parted for our separate ends of the country. [I normally wrote down everything that we did together, but I didn't for this trip, so the details are fuzzy.]
We planned on seeing each other again in November, when David was supposed to come to Fort Meade near Baltimore for a 5 week language training course. I was absolutely thrilled that we'd get to spend so much time together in one chunk but alas, the military, as it often does, decided to change its mind and David's trip was cancelled which meant that we wouldn't see each other again until Christmas Eve. I tried to be philosophical about it but it wasn't the best time to be disappointed. San Diego had nearly burnt to the ground in October--and my best friend's family lost their home--and then my aunt, my mom's sister, passed away. All I wanted was to have David close by and since there was nothing we could do about the distance between us, I tried to focus on school and on not having a mental breakdown.
Somehow, I survived the semester and joyously left D.C. to fly home to California. I was looking forward to seeing David for the first time in 4 months and finally getting a ring to put on my finger....but since this installment is already so dang long (why am I incapable of brevity?) the story of our engagement and wedding will be the next and, I hope, final chapter of this never-ending saga. But I'm making no promises.
1 comment:
Your sooo right! Your nephew is the most adorable boy ever. I hear his sister is just as cute!
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