Once upon a time (about two weeks ago) I was lying in bed (at
9:30pm) reading a book. Randomly, my
cell phone beeped alerting me to a text message. (I say randomly because, let’s
be serious, why do I even have a cell phone?!
No one ever calls me. Except
Kristy. And my mom.) The text said (and I quote) “Can you come to
our house for FHE on the 17th?”
I looked at it, only needing a second to know what was going on. My sister-in-law, Esther, was setting me up
and trying to be sneaky about it. Why,
do you ask, did I know this without out any further information being given to
me? Because this is the first and only
time I have been invited over to Esther and J.R.’s house for FHE (when I wasn’t
living with them) and I just knew.
Esther mentioned wanting to set me up with someone she knew towards the
beginning of the year, but then nothing ever happened with it. Fine.
Whatever. If it’s meant to be, it’ll
happen (and all that crap). I asked her
a few months ago about what ever happened to the guy and she said, “He’s lame
and said he’s given up on dating and has decided he’s just not going to get
married.” Awesome. Sounds exactly like the kind of guy I want to
be set up with. However, that apparently
all changed rather suddenly (as evidenced by this text message). I said, “Yes” (because I’m a glutton for
punishment, apparently.)
Fast forward to tonight…
He was 15 minutes late.
But, I’m not going to hold that against him. Surprisingly, he was cute. VERY tall (and I’m not just saying that
because I’m short. The top of my head
only came up to his shoulders). Glasses
and dark hair. A big guy, but not
necessarily fat. We had an opening song
(Barbara and John decided they wanted to sing Jesus Wants Me for a Sunbeam)
then had a prayer and family business.
Family business turned into more of a get to know you session, which was
good. He knows how to carry on a
conversation and didn’t freeze up in awkward/new social situations (which is a
point in his favor). Found out he also
works at UOP as a Finance Advisor, so we had a lot to talk about swapping
stories about students and complaining about things. We talked about different books we’ve read
and TV shows that we watch (by his own admission he’s a big TV watcher like
myself and we had some of the same favorites—Firefly, Bones, White Collar, and
bonus! He said he liked Once Upon A Time
after I said I’d just spent the weekend rewatching the first season). He’s dyslexic and he and J.R. got in to
talking about guns and paintballing, so it seems like he’d fit in with my
family. Found out his grandparents used
to live up in Oregon and he used to go up there every summer to visit them, so
we have that in common as well.
Esther texted me sometime last week (I don’t remember the
exact day) and asked me to be in charge of giving a five minute spiritual
thought. Turns out my thought was
actually the lesson, so I was the keynote speaker. No biggie.
(rolls eyes) I just shared a few
thoughts from my lesson yesterday about deciding who’s side of the line we’re
on and making sure we’re keeping the commandments, which lead into a good
little gospel discussion for a few minutes.
The kids started getting restless at that point, so we had refreshments
and sat and talked some more (side note: we both chose the same ice cream
flavor—chocolate chip—which I saw as a good sign). Then we had family prayer and he left.
There weren’t any plans made to see each other again, but I
did tell him to IM me at work so…we’ll see.
I don’t know how old he is, but he’s been in a family ward for a while
which leads me to believe he’s in his 30’s somewhere. His name is Jeremy Jenkins (and no, I’m not
make that up). I’ll definitely keep you
posted if anything more happens…
