Valentine's Forever - Part 1

I thought it'd be fun to share our story. It is a beautiful one led by God.

It all began in elementary school and possibly before that. Matt and I both went to the same Vacation Bible School at Houston Northwest Bapt. Church and could have played together there in preschool. Matt says he remembers me at Metropolitan Bapt. church during Sunday School or even another Vacation Bible School when we were in elementary school. He described a few sweaters I wore and I couldn't believe he remembered that. The pics below are of us about the age we were when we went to VBS together in elementary school. Actually we were probably a little older but these are the only pics I could find!


Then, we were in the same youth group at church and were acquaintenances as we both participated in different activities with the church. One of them was a beach trip where two of our friends had a crush on each other. Another was choir where I had to keep track of his attendance.

We went to separate high schools but at the beginning of our junior year, his family moved and he ended up at my high school. We bumped into each other, said hi, learned each other's name, and compared class schedules. We ended up being in the same english class. We had a great time in that class together. Our English teacher was an odd bird and we would look at each other and CRACK up laughing. I had never laughed that hard in all my life. Part of the reason I laughed so hard was because Matt was really good at imitating her. She would always wear shirts that showed cleavage and she would take her pen or pencil and scratch in between her cleavage during her lecture and get this funny grin on her face. She had the weirdest expressions. She was pretty clueless to what was going on around her and Matt and I would pass notes, even throw them across the room at each other and she wouldn't notice.

Then the phone calls started. Matt would call me and want to get together to "study". : ) No, we really would study and get stuff taken care of, but I think he just wanted to hang out because a lot of times that we would get together, he was unmotivated to study and I would get frustrated with him. : ) He was very entertaining though. We'd listen to music, watch t.v., laugh, other friends would come over, we'd eat Blue Bell ice cream, and occassionally I would give him a neck massage. His place was always a good hang out place for our friends. He was always getting people together and planning fun stuff for all of us to do. So, I'd always get invited for the most part. He'd also ask me to go with him to run errands or see if I needed to go the same place he did and I could tag along. We'd run to the store to get stuff for our parents or go get frozen yogurt.

He would also call me to just talk. We would talk on the phone for a long time almost everyday. We became really good friends before I knew it. We were both very involved with our youth group at church and had a great youth minister who challenged us. When we talked on the phone we would talk a lot about what we were learning and would hold each other accoutable for spending daily time with God. We would encourage each other. We would also have some good laughs.

He gave John (my brother) and I a ride to school for a while in his ratty old car that he called "the roach". He was fun to ride with...always very entertaining for John and I.

He had a crush on me and I didn't know it. I wasn't interested in him in that way nor was I attracted at the time. I just really enjoyed hanging out with him and he was a good friend, or even like a best friend. He told me later that he didn't want to ruin our friendship or scare me off so he never told me he was interested. He just tried to give me hints here or there that I never clued in to. The pic below is Matt and I at my drillteam competition up in Dallas. Isn't my outfit funny? I hated that outfit. He and our friend Drew were up visiting Drew's dad and they swung over to the competition. I was so surprised to see them!


After about a year of hanging out we both became good friends with a girl that also went to our church and who I was in drillteam with. They soon took interest in each other (Matt said he had given up on the idea that I'd ever clue in to him being interested in me and he didn't want to ruin our friendship). So, they started dating and he'd call me for advice when he wasn't sure how to read her. She was one of my best friends and she and I both thought a lot alike in most situations. So, I'd try to help him out and encourage that relationship. They were both special to me and I was happy they were together. I thought it was great they were dating. Here's our senior pictures.



We would still all hang out with others from the youth group and sometimes I would end up on double dates with Matt, although Matt wasn't my date. On one occassion I was not enjoying my date at all. He was driving me crazy and I wasn't interested at all. It was funny. So, that night my friend agreed to sit in the front seat next to the guy so I wouldn't have to and Matt sat in the back seat with me. We were laughing so hard in the back seat over the situation and it soon turned into us joking around and even tickling each other of all things. It was very innocent. I wasn't trying to steal my friend's boyfriend or anything. I wasn't interested. We were just having a fun time. Now that I think about it, I think it all began because we were trying not to laugh back there over me "ditching" my date and then it became funny for us to try and make each other laugh out loud. Not sure. Anyway, pretty funny. Here's a pic of us leaving on a double date...drillteam ball.


I remember going on mission trips that he went on as well. We also double dated to prom. I went with my then boyfriend who was living with Matt's family at the time because he was having a hard time. Matt eventually go upset with me b.ecause everytime I would call his house I would now ask for my boyfriend and not really talk to him. I think he missed my friendship. Here is a picture of us headed to prom.



We would butt heads a lot. Matt was always very honest and blunt, which is a good quality to have but it also makes for some confrontation. He once told me that he could never marry me because I was wanting to marry someone like Jesus and expecting that person to be perfect. That made me so mad and hurt my feelings. : ) But, yeah, I had high expectations and I was proud of them. I wanted a Godly man to marry. It's funny to look back on now because Matt is more like Jesus than most people I know and I married him!

We ended up visiting East Texas Baptist University together along with two other friends. We had found out about it through a few other friends from church who attended there. So, we took a road trip up there to check it out. We liked it and several of our friends and us all ended up there together the next year. We still hung out the first year but then we each started making our own separate friends and Matt and his girlfriend ended breaking up the year after that. Things just didn't work out between the two of them. Matt and I each ended up dating different people at school and having fun. The first and second pictures are of us our first semester at college. The last one is us carpooling back to school after coming home for one weekend.
Matt is the one in the middle being held by his friends

Me in my frilly dorm room

Carpooling....aren't my shorts just great? : )

Matt began to get more and more attractive to me and I noticed that he was dating some beautiful girls and paying less attention to me. It's funny, I would be looking out my dorm window and see him and a beautiful girl walking out to a car, getting in, and driving off. I think I started getting a little jealous and missing him. Here's a pic of Matt and some of his fraternity brothers with the president of the university. He is the one with the peach shirt on.


We would still double date ocassionally and there was a time when he brought his new girl friend I didn't know, to meet me. We look back on it now and feel sorry for this girl. To us it was innocent. We just really thought a lot of each other and I guess wanted each other's approval. One time when I was dating a guy, Matt stopped us and told us that we were good together and to not let anyone look down on us for taking things slow and being friends. That meant a lot to me because I held his opinion in high regard. The pic below is of Matt "auditioning" to be Mr. ETBU. It was a big joke and soooo funny. He even "played the electric guitar" at one time during tryouts. (He won by the way). : )


As I was dating this guy, I began to miss the friendship that I had with Matt all those years and I even told the guy that. I told him that I wanted to have the same kind of friendship that I had with Matt....with him. That must have been a little disturbing although he handled it well!!!! : ) I had also told one of my friends in private that I really missed Matt, was becoming attracted to him, but I didn't feel like I knew him very well anymore since we hadn't hung out in a while and we had made new friends. Here's a pic of my friend that I told...Suzanne.


Well, it wasn't long before my boyfriend and I broke up because he was ready to get married and I wasn't sure I wanted to move in that direction with him yet. I felt like we were still getting to know each other and I was wanting the kind of friendship I had with Matt with the person I would marry some day. I didn't feel like we had a very solid friendship. I had always wanted to marry my best friend. The pic below is of me handing down my homecoming queen crown. Matt was there and it was the first time he told me I looked beautiful.



One spring night after that, I ran into Matt outside in the parking lot. We began talking and ended up in his car to continue to talk. We just caught up on life with each other and then I told him that I really missed his friendship. I told him I missed the friendship we had in high school where we would do homework together and just hang out with each other and our friends. I can't remember everything he said but he was real sweet and said we could hang out. He was still dating that girl that he brought to meet me not too long ago.

We started traveling together that spring with a recruiting team for ETBU. I was in the singing group and Matt ran the sound for us. It was fun to get to hang out with him every other weekend or so. Here's a pic of us back by the sound booth. Excuse my aweful hair.


Not long after that we were both headed home from school to visit home and we decided to carpool. We had a fun time riding together and we did some more catching up. I told him about my relationship with my boyfriend ending and the story behind it all. He shared with me that his relationship with his girlfriend was a bit rocky and he wasn't sure if it was going to work out. He was going to be spending the summer working with her and so he felt like that would determine a lot. She didn't go to school with us. I was hoping deep down inside that they wouldn't work out because I wanted him all to myself. I really missed him.

Well, he headed off to camp to work that summer and I stayed on campus to work. It was a hard summer because my ex-boyfriend and I had to work together. Stephanie remembers. She worked with us too. Before Matt left we exchanged phone numbers to keep in touch. I called one day and about died because his girlfriend answered his phone and I felt so bad for calling. I didn't want to hurt her and make her feel like I was trying to steal her boyfriend. She said he was really sick and so she was over at his place helping him. I didn't call after that because it made me uncomfortable and I didn't want to get in the way of their relationship. For all I knew before calling, they could have broken up because Matt wasn't sure they were going to work out. But, evidently they hadn't, so I was going to back off. Here's a pic of me and some of the other girls I worked with that summer. I'm on the far left. Steph is the one in the cute shorts overalls. We were about to move these couches with the guys over to another dorm. We were gophers for the university that summer.


I can't remember if Matt called me back or not. I think she gave him the message but he may have forgotten to call back....not sure. But, that summer, on my birthday, out of the blue, Matt showed up on campus where I was working. I can't remember why but he knew it was my birthday and he totally brightened my day. He had some time to hang out and so he drove Steph and I to take some stuff to get dry cleaned for our work. We had fun. You can't not have fun with Matt. I just thought it was so cool that God led him to show up knowing it would make my day more special. I was kinda down and lonely that day. After returning to his work that summer he called me one or two times just to keep in touch and say hi. They weren't long conversations.

He and his girlfriend were still kind of on the rocks when he returned to school that fall, for reasons unrelated to me. Matt and I started hanging out like we did in high school. I was doing my Student Teaching and I would go over there to work on stuff for that and he'd help me grade papers at times, thank goodness! It was very time consuming. He would do school work too and his roomate would be there along with other friends that would stop by. We spent a lot of time talking and catching up. We would talk about high school here or there and just had fun hanging out once again. I worked at a bar-b-que place as a waitress at the time and I would bring him BBQ on the way home from work because he loves BBQ. I had been dating a little bit here or there for fun but it became more evident to me that those times didn't compare to my special times with Matt, the bond we had, and the way we clicked. I was falling in love. I felt bad because ocasionally Matt's girlfriend would call when I was over there hanging out or when I had just stopped by and she would know I was over there. Matt feels terrible looking back on it now. But, she was a good sport knowing we had been good friends for a while but also knowing deep down that we would probably end up together (she told Matt this later).

Matt and I really enjoyed each other. We held a special place in our hearts for one another and loved hanging out. One thing I loved about us was that we were both very independent individuals and could spend time apart and be our own person, yet we could still feel close and loved doing things together and helping each other.

Matt and his girlfriend broke up in the middle of that fall I believe, for reasons unrelated to me. They just didn't work out. I was soooo excited! I could now not feel bad for the times that we hung out and see if Matt was interested in me. We began to hang out more and got closer. One evening he asked if I would cut his hair. I was hesitant and it was funny because I was telling him the story about when I cut one of my friend's bangs in middle school and we started laughing and then I cut a big chunk out of the middle of her bangs. So, we had to cut them really really short to make them even. But, even in spite of that he let me cut away. I loved getting to cut his hair and he loved me doing it! : ) I would stay over there late and grade papers and eat ice cream and I didn't like having to go back to my campus apartment. It was nice to be with him.

One day I had left his place and gone to the store to get a few things and was driving back to my campus apartment in my very old, run down, reliable Dodge Omni. : ) As I thought about Matt, I just knew in my heart that he was probably the one for me to marry. It was surprising yet wonderful. We were still just friends but it just made sense. It just felt right knowing I could be myself and thrive as who God had made me to be as an individual yet also really needed his companionship, help, and encouragement. I just wasn't sure if he felt the same way or if he just considered me as a friend. But I was thrilled that God had worked it out to where things didn't work out with his girlfriend and my boyfriend several months back. We now had an opportunity to be together.

I finished my student teaching that fall, which completed my time at school, and Matt and other friends were helping me pack up my stuff to head home for the holidays and to look for a job. Matt still had one more semester to finish that spring because he had changed majors early on. I was going to take a load down to where I was from and then come back to get another load soon after that.

My friend that I had confided in a year beforehand about missing Matt, being attracted to him, etc., was also "in the know" about my new feelings for Matt that fall. She told me the morning we were packing that she told Matt the night before about how I was really interested in him but didn't want to ruin my friendship with him, and wasn't sure if he would ever be interested. When she told him, he was shocked and was excited. He told her that he had a huge crush on me in high school but never told me because he didn't want to ruin our friendship, and that he had just kind of given up on the idea. I couldn't believe she told him but yet I was so excited and happy he seemed to feel the same way. We were both on cloud 9 that day as we packed but never said anything to each other about it all. We didn't really have the opportunity. Here are a few shots of Matt and another friend the morning he helped me pack...the same morning I found out he and I both had feelings for each other.




More tomorrow!