When Joey and I started dating he told me I should write down the little things that brought us together, “Our stories”. My mom on more than one occasion stated that the early stages of our relationship sounded more like a comedy than a romance suggesting that I write them down. While I have decided to go ahead and document our lives, starting with when we meet in Aug 2002 or maybe February 2002. Now this has been nearly a 10 year story so it may happen in quite a few posts over the next couple of months. I hope to be finished before I leave for my GSE trip.The reason I’m writing this now is that during the past couple weeks I have become reflective of the early portion of Joey’s and my relationship. For the past month I just keep being reminded through radio, TV, devotions and personal reflection that things change. On the radio something to the effect of “During the early portion of a relationship a couple will stay up all night talking and be fine the next day on just ‘Love and Good Feelings.’ Now if 10 o’clock rolls around its time for bed.” That defiantly defined us, I could stay up all night talking to Joey and now we have a rule, nothing important gets brought up after 9pm.
So I have begun to ponder when and why does this change happen. Whatever the reason it has caused me to spend a lot of time thinking about our story. I hope that in telling our story I can be honest, sharing the good and the bad, the ups and down, the tears and joys.
Part 1- the meeting:
Now depending on which of us you ask we meet at different times.
Joey’s story goes something like this:
It was a warm August night, I was on my way back to my dorm after celebrating my birthday in Luray with my dad and grandma. Due to the late hour I was required to park a distance from my dorm and was cutting through the Vines Center to get back.
What, is she waving at me, yeah she is.
“Hi, I thought you were my friend Steve, sorry.”
I reach out my hand “I’m Joey”
“I’m Elisabeth” she said as she got closer with a smile that lit up the room.
That was it as we talked for the next 45 minutes time stood still. When the conversation ended and we were forced to return to our dorms due to curfew I couldn’t get her out of my mind. I ask the guys in my hall if they knew who she was, to me she was amazing.
My story starts a little before that:
It was a cold weekend in February, I was finishing RA interview. All the applicants where filing into a room for a bit of debriefing before being sent on our way I saw a friend talking to a “Marriot Boyfriend.” A marriot boyfriend was our girl code for a cute boy that you never wanted to speak too, the theory was that once they opened their mouth all physical attraction would be wiped away by the dumb things that came out of their mouths. Well I couldn’t resist, I walked over and sat down.
“Hi, Jude”
“Hi, Elisabeth, this is Joey.”
Well the conversation continued and wow this Joey guy wasn’t an idiot, after the meeting was over the three of us went to cafeteria to have lunch.
Our lunch was fun and lighthearted and this guy seemed really cool. Two or three days later I saw him in the cafeteria again and never the shy girl I smiled and said “Hi”. The response was a stare as if to say “who are you”.
I go to the table of my friends and recount the story and we determine that was another reason we didn’t speak to Marriot boyfriends. The ones that weren’t idiots were shallow, when he had no one better to talk to it was cool to eat lunch with me and now that the Abercrombie group was here he was with them and couldn’t even acknowledge that he knew me. (Abercrombie defines the group of wealthy, well dressed students that everyone knew of even though there were 6,000 people on campus)
This brings us to Aug 2002:
After being cooped up in a dorm room for nearly 2 weeks during preparation to be RA’s, Cynthia my co-RA and I decided to head over to the vines center for a quick run. After a few minutes I decided to run the stairs and leave Cynthia to run on the concourse at the top. As I begin to run down a set of stairs I notice Steve a friend I had not seen since last semester and decided to say hi. I begin to cut through the chairs and he begins to walk closer. Soon “Steve” is in full view, I’m still 20 feet away. “Uhh” I think, “I’m now clearly obligated to talk to that guy, there is no way I can just turn and walk away without being utterly rude.” I had met him the pervious school year and he was a Jerk with a capital J. I decide to play it like we had never met.
“Hi, I thought you were someone else, sorry.” Hoping I could walk away I became even more appalled when he stuck out his hand and said “I’m Joey”
Clearly he wanted to have a conversation with me…. AHHHH……Being the nice polite Christian girl that I am I decided to just smile and nod. Just because he is rude doesn’t give me the right to be. I politely listen as he tells me that he just had a birthday and is on his way back from his grandmas. Then offered me candy saying she had sent it with him.
“What a creep”, I thought, “doesn’t he know that any good mother taught her children not to take candy from strangers let alone one that was already identified a creep.”
But instead I responded, “No thanks, my birthday is in two weeks and I’ll be 21 too.” Oh no I just opened up a can of worms. The conversation continues for what seems like an eternity.
I notice it is almost curfew, finally an excuse to get out of this conversation.
Upon return to the dorm Cynthia asks, “What took you so long?” “You wouldn’t believe what happened” I replied and then proceed to tell her the horrors of my evening and what had happened during the RA interviews. During my ranting, Lindsay a freshman across the hall walked in and listened and laughed and I told the story. After completing my story Lindsay says, “I get feelings about these things, you are going to marry him.” Then Cynthia who was engaged to a “Joey” said, “Yeah, with a name like that” We laughed and I said “Yeah, I’m sure I’ll never talk to him again”.
