Even true love needs maintenance

Many people when they hear a story about “love at first” sight they roll there eyes.  They think it is a fairy tale.  That it never happens like that in the movies.  Well, that may be, but I fell in love with my wife at first sight.  It just took me a few years to realize it.  I first saw her at a church singing...  ...well I can't really remember the song but I do remember that she had a beautiful voice to go along with her gorgeous body and sweet demeanor.  I watched her as she finished the song.  She was too shy and too humble to even look at the audience; much less a new guy in town that could not stop looking at her.  I being shy myself, didn't talk to her after the service but asked my family, who happened to be members of the church, who she was.  

They told me her name, but discouraged me from seeing her.  I asked why in a somewhat miffed tone, knowing that my family always knows what is best for me no matter what I think.  Then they dropped the bombshell.  She was sixteen.  My heart sank because I was twenty-one.  I immediately began to count how long it would take her to be old enough to date and then graduate college.  I tried to run through every scenario I could to try and figure out a way that I could date her without her parents killing me and my family not nagging me to death.  It seemed impossible.  I know this might seem a bit much for someone you have never even talked to, but my heart melted when she sang that day.

I had never heard a woman (young woman) sing like that - in person anyway.  She mesmerized me.  She was the muse that enchanted my heart to sail closer and closer to her sweet soft voice.  But that dream soon ended with my family's discouragement of the idea.  I had long been a mama's boy and I wasn't about to break that chain.  Well, I soon forgot the matter even though she still sang from time to time.  A little time passed and a lady from this same church approached me.  She told me she had a daughter that she wanted me to meet.  I thought nothing of it and went on with life.  A few weeks later this same daughter, by pure coincidence, showed up at church.  She was very pretty.  Then her mother wasted no time in introducing us to each other.  

Then she invited me to diner with her and her daughter.  I decline not wanting to get into a relationship at the time, especially not while I was still thinking about the singer.  So I made up a lame excuse and didn't think about it much, until the daughter showed up again the next week.  Then the next and the next.  Me in my blondness thought she must really like it at this church.  My family in their infinite wisdom encouraged me to ask her out because she was obviously interested in me.  So I hesitantly agreed.  I began talking with the daughter of the woman and I walked her to her car.  Some how I sucked up enough courage to ask her to go get something to eat next weekend.  She looked uninterested at first like it was a complete surprise but gracefully accepted my offer.  So as all first dates went for me I picked her up and tried to act someone intelligent.  Trying not to let my shyness and sweaty palms show.  Kind of like on the “Sixth Sense” where he saw a ghost and left his hand prints on the table.  

Well, anyway I got through the first date without making a fool of myself.  We learned a little about each other.  She was an art student majoring in photography, while I was a musician trying to make any kind of living.  (It seemed like I made more money with odd jobs than with music.  But that is another story).  So as we got to know each other we became friends and the friendship turned into more.  As I got deeper into the relationship with the artist, my relationship with the singer seemed more of a distant memory than a hopeful dream.  Life was good.  I was dating a woman I was falling for and a woman my family finally liked.  Her family took me in as well.  We continued our relationship and made plans for the future.  

Meanwhile, the singer who was less than a fond memory came up to me and asked if I would teach her how to play the piano.  I agreed, in need of money, thinking that the extra money would help my meager earnings.  So, week after week we met for an hour.  At first it was a bit of a bother to try to fit it in my schedule but I surprisingly began to look forward to our short hour together.  So I began to wonder if I made a mistake by listening to my family and not waiting to find out more about her.  When I talked to her and looked at her I could see my future.  I could see everything that I wanted.  What am I doing, I thought.  What would my family think if they knew that I had second thoughts?  What would everyone that knows all of us think?  

I had bought a ring, by my families advice, to ask the artist to marry me.  But how could I be feeling this way?  This is not how love is supposed to be.  No I reasoned, it must just the age old problem with men and commitment.  I really did love the artist.  I mean my family and everyone else couldn't be wrong could they?  I was going mad.  I had no one to turn to.  But soon my worries would be over.  The singer went off to college to pursue accounting, so that ended the weekly confusion.  So there I was again, with my artist love a little more broke but still my love was intact.  I knew for sure that this was God's way of telling me that I should marry the artist.  At least that is what I thought.  The artist (excuse the pun) began to show her true colors.  

At the time I was working on a project of works that I was going to submit to a record company.  The artist began to call me several times a day to complain about different things.  First her work, next her dysfunctional family.  A few phone calls a day turned in to more frequent rings.  Just as I would get inspiration for something worth writing down the phone would ring.  I tried to be supportive but it was becoming unbearable.  Not the fact that she needed me, but the reasons she did.  Her mother that introduced us was used to getting her way.  Her mother was rich and snobby, and hated the fact that I was a starving musician.  She liked to control her daughter and often complained about her choices in life.  She would complain about things like her major in college and her choice of me.  Soon every conversation was about mean things that her mom did and how she needed me.  The artist was soon talking about running away together and get away from everything.  To get away from her moms control.  The artist let her mom control her because she had no other means of finance.  So she had to rely on her.  I knew that running from your problems was not the answer so I told her to hang in there and we would figure a way out.  

That all happened up to the day that I had planned to ask her to marry me.  I began to doubt us again.  I was wondering if it was worth it.  If this is how it would be for the rest of my life; and was this how love was supposed to be.  I went to my family and told them that I had doubts.  My family shrugged my doubts off and told me I had cold feet.  She was surely the one - my family told me.  So trusting my family who were wiser than me I asked the artist to marry me.  Things seemed to calm down at first because we were more focused on making plans than our problems.  But as the date of the wedding drew nearer things got steadily worse.  She began complaining about her mother, about me, about my choice of a career.  Thinks that her mother had complained about and that we talked about.  We made our minds up when we first talked about commitment that we would love each other even if that meant being poor the rest of our lives.  But, all that came tumbling down one day.  

She gave me an ultimatum.  A month before our wedding.  She said this is all we will ever have.  Then, she asked me to give up my music and start a real career or she would leave me.  I might be a musician but I saw right though her mothers plan.  Her mother hated me because I was poor.  She was not going to have her daughter marry a poor man where she would have to continue to support both of them.  Her mom gave her an ultimatum so she was giving me one.  If I didn't submit to her and her mom then she would leave me.  That was the real ultimatum.  I reminded her of our promise to each other a while back and how money didn't matter and that she needed to chose money or me.  Needless to say she chose money.  I would be lying if I said it didn't hurt.  It really did.  There were nights that I cried out and asked God why has this happened to me?  What did I do?  Did I do the wrong thing?  Did I pass up a good life and a good love over my stupid passion that probably would not be able to support me anyway?  

Or maybe there was a bigger picture and God was saving me from a lifetime of grief?  What ever it was I was a broken man.  A little time went by and I heard different versions of stories from everybody about the breakup.  Untrue stories like, how I ran off with another woman, and left her in the cold.  If that were true I wish I could have met that other woman.  More time went by and people moved in, including me.  Anyway, I thanked God for the lesson learned and for getting me out of the mistake that I almost made.  Things were looking better for my career in music and I moved to a new house that I had purchased.  Even though things were looking up I was still lonely because I had no one to share my life successes with.  

As I was organizing junk, as I call it; I came across a picture of the singer.  Then, like a light bulb, a thought popped into my head.  Call her and see how she is, I thought.  But, I don't know her number and even if I did, would she even want to talk to me.  She would probably think that I was stalking her or something.  But curiosity got the best of me.  So I asked a friend of a friend, and got her number.  It took me all day to get the courage up to call her; but I finally did.  When I heard her voice, all the memories I had of her singing in church and teaching her the piano, all came back to my mind, like it all happened yesterday.  Nervously, I talked to her for a little while and found out that she had changed her major to music.  This just added to the excitement.  I ended the conversation by asking her to meet me for coffee to discuss the music industry and strategies to take.  I will admit I asked her for more than that reason and hoped that she accepted for the same hidden reasons.  

When I saw her again for the first time, I would not have thought that it was possible, but she was even more beautiful than I remembered.  I could feel my whole body trying to shake but I could not let it show.  I had to be cool and collected.  Just in case she didn't feel them same.  Was this a stupid idea?  Surely she couldn't have felt the way I did back then and still do even more now?  But I had to know.  So off we went to a local coffee shop.  We talked most of the night, catching up on old times, music and family.  It was the most I had talked to anybody in a while.  I was hanging on every word she had to say.  I just couldn't believe I was here with her.  Then, a perfect night seemed to come to a crashing halt.  "You're engaged.  Oh, congratulations."  I couldn't believe this.  Here I was putting on the charm hoping that this was the start of something real and now it was over.  

I asked her questions about her fiancée' but the more I asked the more depressed she got.  I could tell she wasn't happy and from her stories this was the best time she had had in a long time.  Then I began to tell her my story with the artist.  How I loved her but it was so hard to love her it didn't seem right.  I didn't want to break up with the woman I was with because of what everyone else thought.  Because everyone else thought it was right.  I was afraid to listen to me heart.  

She had a similar story and I could see her walking into the same trap I did.  And I knew that her heart was telling her the same as my heart did.  As I was finishing up my story and I could see she was hurt like I was, I blurted it out before I even though about it.  I let it all out that I had feelings for her when I first met her and that the more I knew her the more I wanted to be with her.  Her jaw dropped.  She gained her composure and said she felt the same.  "Why didn't you tell me?" she asked.  I was to afraid and my family had to strong of an influence on me.  As I told her, she began to frown.  I was wondering what was wrong.  We both felt the same; what could be wrong?  "It is too late." she said.  She made a commitment and had too much invested into her current relationship just to abandon it.  My heart broke all over again; but worse.  All this time I could have been dating her but I wasted those years because of what other people wanted for my life.  

We made the best of what was left of the night.  I walked her to her car and wished her luck.  But I could not let it go.  I lost her one time; I wasn't going to lose her again without a fight.  Without her knowing just how I feel.  So I told her to kiss me.  If she felt nothing then she would know for sure that she should stay with her fiancée'.  But if she did then that would just add to her doubts about him already.  She declined.  So I opened her car door and wished her luck again.  But in the middle of my good bye she put her hand across my face gently and pressed her lips against mine.  It was wonderful.  It was like all my first kisses in just one.  Time stood still and my future again passed before my eyes.  I really don't know how long the kiss lasted but longer than it should have for a woman that was engaged.  We stopped and looked at each other.  I was wondering if she felt what I did.  I waiting impatiently for her to respond.  She looked down and said she had to go.  

Just as quick as she left the first time she left again.  Stupid, Stupid, Stupid.  I not only missed a possible relationship with her I also lost a good friend.  The next few days I was numb.  Not knowing what to feel or how to feel it.  I knew I would never hear from her again.  But God loves to prove you wrong.  A week later she calls me up.  I was stunned.  We talked a lot about nothing at first.  I was trying to figure out why she called.  Maybe to gloat, or to make herself feel better about leaving, or for closure.  I didn't know and the more we talked the more I became curious.  "So how is your fiancée'" I asked.  "We broke up," she said.  Waahooo!!  I could believe it.  Of course I just said a simple "oh" in response.  So we talked about getting together later for coffee.  We did and it was worth the wait and the heartache I went through to get there and here.  Soon after that we got married, against my family's wishes because of lack of time.  But soon after we were married everyone realized that we were meant to be together.  So am I telling this story to tell people not to listen to there family.  No, rather listen to your family for advice, but listen to your heart for life.  

Comments From Readers