Ten years ago today, my husband and I became an "official" couple. I would say, little did I know that this man would change my life in so many ways, but that would be a lie. I did know. I knew before we were "official" that I loved him. I knew I would marry him. I even wrote in a journal I kept back then, not three weeks after we started dating, that this was the man I would marry. So, see. I have proof.
Jacob is the most amazingly wonderful person I have ever had the pleasure of knowing, and I thank God every day that somehow, some way, this man fell in love with me and asked me to be his wife. That for some reason he loved me back, as much as I loved him, and wanted to spend his life with me. But let me start at the beginning. After all, this blog post is meant to be a tribute to this incredible man of mine. The story of us, from the beginning until now. This is going to be a two parter. Maybe even three. But everybody likes a good romance, right? :)
I met Jacob when I was 20 years old. I was very, very green when it came to love. To life, really. I was a baby. I thought I knew things--I was wrong. Hell, I think I know things now, and I'm probably still wrong. You never stop growing, stop learning. But that, my friends, is a different blog post.
Back to the story. It was the summer of 2003. I'd just come out of the roughest patch of my life. So rough that I dropped out of college, alienated my best friends, and run off to Texas for 3 months to stay with a family I'd known since childhood. I had to get out of town. I had to get away from the things that seemed to be chasing me, to be gnawing at me. I'd lost what little confidence I had, and I was teetering on the edge of disaster. I won't delve into the reasoning for this black hole in my life--it hasn't had an effect on me for a long, long time now, and if I were to re-hash it, this post is definitely not the place.
I'd stayed in Texas from January to the end of March. I came home, half because I was incredibly homesick and half because I felt like an awful bum living off of this generous family I was staying with. I started speaking to my friends again when I came back, I got a job. I was starting to crawl back from the clutches of depression and emptiness. But I was in no way "there".
Then, towards the end of June, my cousin had gotten married. I'd left the wedding early, because I'd promised one of my best friends I would go with her to break some news to her parents. She chickened out, and here I was sitting at home, steaming because I could still be having fun at the reception, and I would have felt stupid going back. So I called my friend Mulan (remember her?) to see what she was doing, and she was at Jacob's house hanging out. They worked together and were good friends.
So off I went to Auburn. I'll admit, I don't remember the exact details of this night. There was a lot of alcohol involved, and I know I was underage, yadda, yadda, yadda. Oh well. It's in the past. I do remember Jacob getting very flirty with me, and running around tickling me. Again, we were so young. He was only 22. It was cutesy at the time. It wasn't the first time I'd met him. I'd even been to his place with Mulan and Rapunzel before, but we'd never really hung out. On this night, when we did, everything just fell into place. It's hard to explain and easy to explain at the same time. Here was this man, this sweet, caring, handsome, funny man. He made me feel so special and adored. He restored my confidence, which was key to getting me to a comfortable place in my life. He saved me.
We fell hard, and we fell fast. It was only a few weeks later that we decided that we were seriously dating. I remember laying on this massive couch he and his roommate (now my brother-in-law) had. It was yellow, and they called it Big Bird. Both of us fit on it comfortably, and we were lying there watching a movie, when the classic "what are we" question came up. Neither of us beat around the bush very long. We knew we were an us. From that moment forward, we have been.
For the next year and a half I spent most of my time at Jacob's house. He got along spectacularly with my friends, because of course, they'd been friends before we even started dating. Which made things easy and fun for me. There is nothing worse than your friends and your significant other being at odds. We crossed that bridge much further along in our relationship, but anyway. A month into us dating he took me to Gulf Shores to meet the family I had yet to meet (his older sister, like I said, was dating his roommate, and we all spent a lot of time together). He tried to make our first Valentine's Day so romantic, but we ended up waiting almost 3 hours at Provino's. It was still special and very much appreciated. I'd never had a man, boy, whatever, try and do special things for me. I was always the girl with the beautiful, popular friends, who was more of a "friend" than a girlfriend to the guys I went to school with. But with Jacob, he was lavishing all of this attention on me. He wanted me. He loved me. I felt like a princess then, and he still makes me feel that way now.He had made me whole again. It's just the sort of man he is.
We spent an incredible weekend in Atlanta in the summer of 2004 for our 1 year anniversary. I'd never dated anyone for more than a few months, an though he'd had a two year relationship in high school, it had been years earlier. We stayed in the most gorgeous hotel, the Georgian Terrace, and were upgraded to a two bedroom suite upon our arrival. We were thrilled and we felt like two of the luckiest people in the world. That was one of the best weekends of my life. We went out to nice dinners, we visited the Atlanta zoo and the Margaret Mitchell house. I love Gone with the Wind, and Jacob couldn't care less about it, but he did it for me. We swam in the rooftop pool at our hotel, with the skyline of Atlanta spread out before us, and we felt like we had the world at our fingertips. Jacob even treated us to third row seats at a Braves game, and had our own attendant! We were two young kids in love and having the time of our lives. I love our life now, but those memories are so special.
By the end of 2004, Jacob's sister and his roommate were engaged, and would be marrying and moving in together soon. So, we decided to move in together, too. I was 22 by then, and he was 24, and we felt we were mature enough and secure enough in our relationship to handle such a thing. I'm proud to say, we were right.
I suppose this post is long enough. I'll try my best to continue tomorrow with part II. Good night!
Ryann
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