Part II: How we Met

DISCLAIMER: All names of the involved persons have been removed from this story to protect the innocent.

So, where did I leave off… oh yes... I had prayed for someone to love me. All I knew is that she had brown hair, would have a good sense of humor and had morals. Believe it or not, it was within about a month that I met Clare Messer. Allow me tell you the story of how we met.

See, we met through friends and I am thoroughly convinced by a grand orchestration of the Lord. Situations like this just don’t happen by coincidence, or by some random chance of fate. I literally asked, and within His time, I received.

How we met was an interesting story in and of itself. It was one of those nights, a Friday I think, I had the night off work and there wasn’t a Dungeons and Dragon’s game going on, so I hooked up with some of those good friends who kept me out of trouble. We met at one of my friends’ houses, and his brother was there with some of his friends. Among that group was a girl, her name was Clare Messer. She had long brown curly hair and was wearing a black shirt, jean shorts and tan western boots (Yes, I distinctly remember this). We all hung out there as we tried to decide what to do. We decided to go to another girl’s house that had a trampoline, who I did not know, (she wasn’t even home). See that was one of the things we did, we liked to go to people’s houses and jump on their trampolines and try not to crack our heads open. Well actually that was just me, everyone else was pretty proficient at jumping on trampolines. When I jumped on a trampoline it was more like a slinky on one of those old paint machines that mixed the paint… it really didn’t work out… I always wound up sprawled out like a bear skin rug, or hanging half way off the trampoline, it could be a dangerous affair for me. Luckily I didn’t hurt myself too bad and usually everyone else got off to avoid being injured by my body flopping around like it did, out of control.

Everyone had a turn jumping on the trampoline that night except me, if I remember right, I chose to stay off, not wanting to make a fool of myself in front of girls I really didn’t know. Though after a while, I did finally climb up there after Clare invited me to jump with her… poor girl. I had refused a few times knowing that Mr. Clumsy didn’t need to be falling off the trampoline. Yet, I conceded and got up there anyway. It was all good until she got a little offended when I fell on her a couple of times. (She thought I was getting “handsy”) I tried to explain to her I was not very coordinated, and I was clumsy… she didn’t buy it. Heck that’s why I studied karate for years and lifted weights religiously since I was twelve to overcome my clumsiness and awkwardness. So, not to offend her anymore or worry her about her safety, I got down and did not get on again.

As it got dark, we were all tired and just doing what young adults do, hang out and talk. I stood in the shadows where it was comfortable. Then it happened.. to my embarrassment, one of my friends asked me to do some of my sound effects. See I was good at making sound effects, especially of cats and dogs. I had grown up around animals all my life, and I always mimicked their sounds. After some chiding and asking continuously, I finally gave in and did a cat fight and barked like a dog from around the corner of the house. Wow, what a way to impress a girl, “watch this, I can bark like a dog”… yeah right. I’m pretty sure those that did not know me that well that night thought I belonged in the looney bin… maybe they were right.

Anyway, it was getting time for us to leave and Clare and her friends were sitting on the patio. Again, I was standing behind everyone, on the outside. As she was trying to put on her boots she turned around and looked at me and said”you are standing in my light” and I was standing right in front of the light on the back of the house, casting a shadow over her. I thought “Wow, what a bitch… I think this girl hates me…”, little did I know she wanted me to come and sit down in front of her and talk, which I did.  By this time I was very confused, because she kept talking to me and asking questions. I didn’t know what to think. I didn’t even know really what she was asking me or what she wanted. I just sat there and gave one word responses.

After a while of awkward conversation, everyone began to leave and making their way to their cars. Then it happened, to my horror, everyone started hugging each other. This was very uncomfortable for me, what the heck was the matter with them? Was someone leaving on a trip or did someone die? They were all hugging each other. Geeezzz. See at the time I didn’t fully realize that all these kids went to church and they all had gone on a retreat called Teens Encounter Christ, which explains why at the time their extremely odd behavior, and to be quite honest, I was a little worried about them. I had never seen people act like that. When my parents tried to hug me, which was not often if I had anything to do with it, it was like they were grabbing a hold of a cold dead fish, my poor parents and what they had to put up with. Human touch was very uncomfortable to me, it was so …embarrassing. So nevertheless, I backed away slowly for fear of someone hugging me. Who knows I might have run away at that moment if that had happened. Yet I distinctly remember in the dark, Clare standing to the far edge of our little group, next to her friend’s car staring at me. That was when that funny feeling came over me like I should do something. But I had no idea what I should do. Should I go speak to her? Should I ask for her phone number? I thought she hated me and we had just met. It was all very confusing. Later that night, on the road, I remember riding through the north part of Grandview, it was dark and I sat in the back seat of my friend’s car. I sat there with my forehead pressed against the window thinking I had screwed up and missed the biggest opportunity of my life and I would never see her again.

To be continued….