be sure and wear the good lipstick

I’ve been trying to decide for some time now whether or not to share this story. It is the story of how my life changed approximately 24 years ago, not that I even had any idea way back then of what would happen or why anything would be significant, but I’ll do my best to explain. So here goes nothing. Once upon a time a timid and shy girl attended her first day of middle school. To say it was intimidating is an understatement. At that same time, in that same school a young boy, who was probably somewhat timid and shy also, started his first day of middle school and so begins our story. I don’t have a memory of the boy in middle school. Nothing flashes through my brain today that indicates we ever noticed each other. In fact fate may have been doing its damnedest to keep us apart. At this particular middle school our entire class was divided into two groups. In seventh grade you were team Delta or team Gamma and likewise in eighth grade you were team Alpha or team Beta. For those of you who know me and went to school with me, please correct me if I’m wrong about those team names. My old lady brain sometimes lets me down, but I digress. Boy was on the opposite team for both my seventh and eighth grade years, so again, we may have brush past each other in the hall, or shared a lunch period, but that was probably the extent of our contact. So onward to freshman year of high school and as time passed I gained some confidence in myself, but not more than you would suspect in a teenage girl who definitely had body and image issues. Again, these years, are mostly a blur of boys and dances and classes and cheerleading and disappointments and deaths and heartaches and laughter and tears and hellos and goodbyes. My senior year something happened that only later becomes apparent. The boy and I shared a class. Now, we might have shared a science class in a prior year, but we can’t be sure. Senior year we sat mere desks apart in Economics. Every day for at least nine weeks, we shared space and air and thoughts and ideas. In June of 1994 we graduate and the boy and I not really knowing each other more than by name and passing conversations here and there over the last four years head off our separate ways. It would be 16 years before either one of us really gave the other a thought, unless we paused on old year book pages and wondered…”what happened to him/her”? I have to give credit to technology and social media for bring me to this part of my life. By all the randomness that the universe holds there was something posted on Facebook, and I don’t recall now if it was a status update or a funny picture, but the boy I once knew said something clever and I think I sent him a friend request, or perhaps he sent one to me, after some humorous banter. Either way, as luck would have it, this boy, who is now a man now becomes my friend. At the time it was nothing more than a connection to an old classmate and I believe we were both involved in separate relationships. Again, I didn’t give it much thought, other than one thing…I didn’t remember how handsome he was or at least I noticed now what I missed all those years before. I also learned that he was in the Army and that this had been his career, more or less, since we left high school. So for the next year or more I saw random posts from him on Facebook, usually just periodic updates that he was currently deployed and that he was grateful for many things…usually small things like a hot shower or a cot that meant he wouldn’t be sleeping on the ground. And it struck me that I liked this man…again, not affectionate feelings, just simply, I like this person who appreciates the smallest joys in a very dark place. I was impressed at his ability to see happiness in small things and that he seemed to appreciate simple pleasures in life. Unfortunately, during that time, he lost his father, and perhaps that was the first time I truly reached out. I remember my heart aching for him and that he was struggling to make it back to the United States to say goodbye to his father and that ultimately that did not happen. It reminded me of when I lost my Aunt Mary (aka Aunt Peanut) and how I wasn’t able to get home before she passed to say my goodbyes and have a final moment with her. So I wrote him a letter of condolence and offered him my story. He was thankful for my words and from there on out I watched and waited for him to post. I was curious to see how his deployment was going and I had decided that when he made it back home for good I wanted to buy him a beer and say thank you. This was also the first time in a long time that I really considered what people in the military go through and sacrifice on a day-to-day basis. Here was a man who lost an opportunity to be with his family because he had to do his job…and his job, folks, is to help protect you and me…to keep an ugly truth of war in another country. Approximately five or six months passed and I realized he was home, and so I sent the first offer to “buy him a beer” when he was in Franklin. I believe he thanked me and probably didn’t give it much thought. How many of us say “I’m gonna buy that soldier a drink” and maybe we do or don’t mean it? What he didn’t know was that I was very sincere. Again, social media steps in and I see he is talking to a mutual friend about a trip to Franklin, so I extend the offer of buying him a beer and tell him I’ll be in Franklin that very same weekend. Now, two things happen. One, we actually make a plan to meet so I can buy him this beer and two, I realize for the first time, I think I might want to really know him. So I explain everything I’ve just told you all here to a friend of mine and her only piece of advice for the night I am to meet him is this, “be sure you wear the good lipstick”. I laughed, but took the advice to heart…and I’m so glad I did. It was June 11, 2011, when I would finally see this boy, now a man, again. I was standing outside of a local bar in Franklin, The Bricks, with my friends Heidi and Tony, when he pulled up in this big, red truck. When he stepped out of the truck I didn’t know what to say, and thank goodness he had to walk a few feet to reach me. He didn’t look much like himself…or rather he didn’t look like the boy I remembered from high school…he looked even better. I remained my cool, calm, collected self on the outside (at least I think I did). On the inside, my sixteen year old self was having a bit of a heart attack because I suddenly realized I had the “warms” for this man and I hadn’t really planned on this being a date, except I wore the good lipstick. I didn’t know if he thought it was a date either. And so the next few hours were mildly awkward…not bad, just not sure how to approach this situation. I’m very thankful that we ran into a number of friends that night and the conversation remained light, and the beers were plentiful, so when a joking game of music trivia (at which I beat him) turned into a friendly wager, which led to a kiss, that has become now one of the best years of my life, and hopefully many more to come. And now you know the first part of our story.