| We met in person for the first time at a coffeehouse at my church. He won a plant in a raffle and it was my job to give him his prize. I remember how cold my hands felt as I handed over the flower pot, glancing up into his deep brown eyes and catching a glimpse of his amazing smile. I think I fumbled through some small talk before wandering off to collect my thoughts and catch my breath. We officially met online several months before that night. His mom, a wonderful and encouraging lady, had been mentoring me through a retreat community we both belong to. She and I are both musicians and she had been training me for the music team while providing me with some serious personal encouragement and words of wisdom. Occasionally she would tell me about her son, a guy about my age who was going to school upstate several hours away. She told me we seemed to have a lot in common and, when she found out I had a Xanga site, she gave me the name of his site so I could check it out sometime. Curiosity got the best of me one day and I checked out his site. I read several entries and was immediately impressed by his ability to present himself so well with words. I liked what he talked about. I admired his level-headedness and eloquence when carrying on a discussion, and I loved the creativity in his stories. One entry in March 2006 really touched me. It was titled “When I am Old,” and it listed out a number of things he would like to accomplish someday, and what kind of person he wants to become when he is an old man. His sentiments rang so very true in my own heart. I thought to myself, “this is a guy I would love to get to know...” But how?? He lived almost 200 miles away, we didn’t have any mutual friends that I knew of (besides his mother, but I didn’t see her all that regularly), and, well… I couldn’t talk to guys. I was terrified of them. The minute I was around a prospective guy my age, I would clam up and chicken out. It took me a while to even comment on my xanga crush’s site. I was about 24 at the time and had never even been on a date. I didn’t like myself very much and was never really surprised when not many guys noticed me, particularly the ones I noticed. At 5’10 ½ “ tall, I have always been tall for my age, fairly plain, and have always been on the bigger side weight-wise. At this point I had pretty much given up on guys, figuring that I just wasn’t the kind of girl guys were interested in. When asked about my love life, I would joke that I was going to be a crazy cat lady and live in someone’s attic with my rocking chair and knitting needles. It was more fun to tell people that than to let them know how hopeless and frustrated I felt. My idea of femininity took a real hit during this time and I had been struggling with some health issues that weren’t helping things. I felt out of place and out of the loop as I watched five or six of my closest friends become engaged and get married. Each time I was fitted for a bridesmaid dress I was reminded of my odd shape as I ordered the plus-sized gown with extra length, hoping it would work for me as they rarely carried my size to try on in the store. It was a fairly dark time for me emotionally as I wallowed in self-pity and began to lose hope. For a long time I was convinced I would never marry and that thought really crushed me inside. I covered my feelings by throwing myself into other things…church activities, work…to the point where I became both physically and mentally spent. At one of my lowest points, my Xanga Crush’s mom really started speaking healing into my life. She provided so much encouragement to me and helped me face many of my insecurities head-on. She shared her own testimony with me and gave me some tips on how to work through some things that were really taking me down. She helped me to learn to get over myself and deal. I began to grow in ways I never knew I could and began to embrace who I was…my strengths and weaknesses, my shape, and my weight, and my femininity. I began to make a conscious effort to be more outgoing and to not let fear stand in the way of things. It was an exhilarating experience, as I learned to step out in faith a bit more and listen to what God had to say instead of the messed up messages about myself I taught myself to believe. I began to think that maybe I wasn’t all that bad after all. My New Year’s resolution for 2007 was to focus on me…not in a self-centered kind of a way, but by caring for myself and taking the time out to be me and do things I enjoy, to focus on my relationships with my friends and family and not on the relationships I didn’t have. The new year brought several new adventures into my life. That July I went on a tropical vacation, spent some good “me” time down at my favorite beach, and moved out on my own to my very own apartment. Things started to look up and more and more joy began to seep into my life. During this time of growth I didn’t realize that God was preparing me for one of the biggest and most wonderful adventures of my life. At that point I had developed a pretty serious crush on this guy with the great eyes and smile, my Xanga Crush. However, I was pretty bummed because I figured that our paths really wouldn’t be crossing anytime soon, as he lived so far away and we didn’t run in any of the same social circles. I had a tendency to think about this guy a lot and finally decided to put my crazy crushiness to good use and pray for him whenever he came to mind (which was quite frequently). I didn’t pray for “us,” but instead prayed for him, for his walk with the Lord, his future career, and for his future, whether it included me or not. I also prayed for myself, that God would help me not to obsess over this wonderful guy who lived so far away. Then, his family joined my church. I saw his family regularly and heard his mom talk about him all the time. I saw him several times when he was home on break but my heart dropped when I heard that he wasn’t planning on returning home to Long Island after graduation in 2007. I continued to pray. I prayed for him, for God’s protection and direction in his life. I had to continually give up the whole situation to the Lord, praying, “God, if You want us to get to know each other, You’ll make it happen. If not, please take this feeling away from me.” And then, unexpectedly, he had to return home to Long Island for a year. My heart hurt for him as his plans for schooling fell through, but a little bit of me was a bit excited to be having him around. Our paths began to cross more and more. We participated in a ministry or two together and our families started hanging out a lot…a whole lot. Our families would get together for dinner and game nights, and we even went to a Scottish Fair together that summer. Something was so wonderfully different about this guy compared to other crushes I had in the past. He was so interesting and fun, and I could really relate to how he looked at the world. Each time I got to talking with my XC, the conversation would flow easily. I started to take more chances and initiate conversation with him, making sure to say “hello” to him each Sunday morning during greeting time. I liked him more and more as I got to know him, but started to notice that he would rarely initiate interacting with me. Sometimes I thought he might even be trying to ignore me. I became confused and a bit down, as I felt that he was rejecting me, but I continued to reach out to him (as much as my shyness would allow). I told myself that I was NOT going to sabotage a possible friendship because I had a crush on this guy. I prayed a WHOLE lot during this time. Most of my prayers started with, “God, what the heck to I do now??.” Just talking to guys made me nervous, so initiating conversation with my XC really took a lot of leaping and stretching on my part…although I later learned that I was still a bit too quiet during this time :D (you can see his side of the story on his site…) As time wore on, I realized that my XC’s mom and my mom seemed to talk about him a lot. I figured that I just noticed it so much because I liked him so much. What I didn’t know at the time was that my mother and his mother, along with several couples from our church were praying for us to get together. My XC was more aware of all of this at the time and, unbeknownst to me, was continually encouraged by his mother to take me out. His reaction to this was to push away from me and from the situation, as he (understandably) did not want to be pushed into a relationship with anyone, particularly with some girl his mom wanted him to date, a girl whom he believed to be “too quiet.” Of course, not knowing all of this at the time, I continued to be confused and a bit frustrated over the whole situation. In October 2007 I asked him out for tea one night after work, for a totally platonic cup of tea. After explaining to him that I was planning on relaxing at a local coffee shop and making it clear that he was the only one I was inviting, he agreed to meet me for a little while. We met at about 7:30pm, closed the place down at 10pm, and stood outside and talked for another two hours before I headed home. We talked about all kinds of things and the conversation just kept on going. The sky that night was green and I think it was a full moon. I melted as he ended the night by reciting a poem about the moon while walking to his car. I don’t think I slept much that night. I have to say that I was pretty disappointed that this interaction did not seem to improve our friendship much. He went back to semi-avoiding me and I went back to my shy, mousy ways. I really don’t know what I expected to happen. I knew it wasn’t a date. I made it clear to him that it wasn’t. Still, maybe I subconsciously thought that maybe he would mention that he had a good time and ask me to hang out again sometime. Maybe I thought he might get to know the “real” me a bit better. No matter, I decided not to ask him out to anything again because I didn’t want to make him feel like I was chasing him down, particularly if he wasn’t interested. As I was surfing around Xanga one day I came across Spokenfor’s site. I enjoyed reading what she had to say and was particularly intrigued by a conversation she had started regarding Christian girls not knowing how to flirt. My XC was part of the conversation and had mentioned that he admires a girl who doesn’t play head games, a girl who is straightforward and isn’t afraid to be confident and be herself. The conversation really had an impact on me and I started to feel like God wanted me to talk with my XC about how I felt. I knew something was up and I wanted to clear the air. So, one Sunday after church I pulled him aside and told him. I told him I had feelings for him, and that I’m a terrible flirt, and that I like his mother and didn’t want him to think I was trying to get at him through her, and that if he is not interested in me I’d be totally fine with that but I just wanted to clear the air...I stared at the floor the whole time and I think I probably turned purple. Then, with such kindness and tact, my XC explained his side of the story to me, that he has been continually encouraged to ask me out and that he thought I was in on “the conspiracy.” I assured him I wasn’t and we shared a chuckle of relief. Then, I gritted my teeth and prepared myself for the “I am flattered by the fact that you like me but I’m just not that interested…”. However, that never came. Instead, to my surprise, he explained that he felt that the only reasonable thing to do at that point was to ask me out on a date and see how things went from there. Holy crap. I didn’t sleep for a week. The first date (we went to a party hosted by a friend from church) was a bit awkward, but within a month things got a whole lot better. He made me feel so at ease and I began to be able to be myself more when I was around him. The more I got to know about this guy, the more I liked him. He had so much patience with me and put up with a lot of my quirkiness due to my random insecurities. He taught me how to trust him and proved himself to be quite trustworthy. At a barn dance, about a month after we started dating, he asked me to wear his ring, which I proudly wore on a chain around my neck. We were “going steady.” How dorky are we...?  As time wore on I was able to show him more of “me” and he just continued to accept all the crazy quirks I threw his way. He made dinner for me on my birthday…he sent me my favorite flowers on Valentine’s day…he told me he loved me and gave me my first kiss…he made me feel like such a princess…He is so stinkin’ amazing, and he continues to amaze me… We’ve been on a bunch of adventures together…to local parks and arboretums, to dances and concerts and museums…we went on this awesome primitive camping trip with some friends up in the Adirondacks…we had such a blast, and we really seemed to work well together as a team. Early on I started to realize that this guy might be “the one.” As our relationship grew, I became more and more certain. We never really talked about “where we were” or anything. Whenever we’d talk about vague future things, we’d say “if/when we get married…,” but we never really went further than that. I didn’t want to push anything because we were doing so well and there was no reason to rush into marriage or anything. Still, I can’t say that it wasn’t on my mind. On September 21st, exactly nine months after our first date, he took me to see the sunrise at a lighthouse at the end of the island. In the early morning hours, I followed him through a path in the woods and across the beach until we found the perfect spot on a large rock. We spread out our blanket, cuddled up next to each other, and gazed at the moon and Orion until the sun rose over the water. It was breathtaking. Just after the sun came up he turned to me and asked me to be his wife. He gave me the most beautiful and unique engagement ring he had designed himself, with his grandmother’s diamond and decorated with my favorite Celtic knot. It was the most magical night and morning, and most romantic proposal I could have ever imagined. I said yes. Well, actually, I said “are you SERIOUS???” about 10 times and then said “yes.” That scared him a bit. hehehe  On Sunday, June 21st, 2009…Midsummer’s Day…I will be marrying my Xanga Crush…my Xanga Fiance…my dear and precious best friend and love…my ChrisRusso . I still cannot believe how blessed and lucky I am to be marrying such a wonderful guy. I know that the Lord brought us together because if it were left up to us, to my shyness and insecurities and his resistance to being “set up,” we would never have gotten together. God has already been blessing us so very much and I am so stinkin’ excited to be marrying my awesome man and getting to share more adventures together “for as long as we both shall live.” God is awesome and He really knows what He’s doing, even when it doesn’t seem like it. Through all of this, He taught me to TRUST Him and to WAIT on Him…and to LISTEN to Him and not myself. It’s amazing how we teach ourselves to think certain things about ourselves (or others), even though they’re not entirely true. Satan is really good at twisting the good stuff God gives us, including our thoughts and our self-image. If there is one thing that I’ve learned from all of this, it is that God can do WHATEVER He wants, despite us and all our faults and stupid stuff. He is SO much bigger than us, and He can bring healing to places we never thought could be reached. I thank God that He brought such a wonderful man into my life. He has used Chris to help me to grow and develop into more of the person I feel that He wants me to be. I pray that the Lord will help me to do the same for my dear fiancé as we live our lives together. |
