October 13th

I remember the exact moment I first laid eyes on Jordan. It was October 13th, 2001 and the night after my 17th birthday (now going on an old 23). Jordan was playing basketball in the Keith’s (our mutual friends) driveway. Now you all have to understand that I was the girl that had very few close girlfriends and very many close guy friends. I pulled up into the Keith’s driveway after cheering at a cheerleading competition. Picture this…me with an unnecessary amount of makeup, gelled hair like glue with an extremely curly pony tail, and a cheerleading uniform. Now if any of you know me at all, this is not particularly my style of choice! For whatever reason, unknown to me, Jordan seemed to find it somewhat attractive. I’m just glad I didn’t scare him away! As I pulled into the driveway and rolled down my window to see what everyone was doing this boy felt the need to stick his head in my window and say “HEY, I’m Jordan!” I was a little caught off guard at first but quickly realized how adorable he was. I immediately started wondering who he was, why he was all of sudden hanging out with my friends, and was he single? After a few minutes of getting to know Jordan I was able to answer all of these questions. Who was he? The boy of my dreams! Why was he hanging out with my friends? He went to church with them. Was he single? Indeed, he was (lucky me)! If you ask Jordan why he stuck his head in my window on that night, this is what he’ll say…Everyone use to call me Norman in high school as Norman is my last name. And like I said before, I hung out with a bunch of guys who thought it was cool to call me Norman. When everyone saw my car pulling into the driveway, all the guys started saying, “Hey, Norman’s here!” Well, Jordan thought that Norman was a boy and wanted to meet “him.” He says when he stuck his head in my window he got the best surprise of his life…ME! Now I’m not one to believe in love at first sight, but I will say that Jordan had me interested from the get go! The rest is history!

So to make a long story short, at age 17 I found the guy of my dreams! How often does that happen? The past 6 years haven’t been all pretty. I’ll be the first to admit we’ve had our ups and downs. But within the past 6 years Jordan and I have had the chance to grow up with one another. We’ve spent some of the most critical years of our lives with each other. We’ve seen each other change from extremely immature teenagers to little immature yet more mature young adults. Not many couples can say that about one another. We both have learned so many lessons about life and love together. Jordan has had an astronomical impact on my life and has every bit of my heart! I know this is so cliché, but he means everything to me and I can’t even begin to imagine what my life would be without him in it. I suppose that my absolute worst fear about this whole thing is wondering if our time together will not only will begin at such a young age, but that it will end at such a young age. Not a day goes by that I don’t think about all of those “what if’s.” I know 6 years seems like a long time and I certainly consider myself one of the luckiest girls to have had this time with Jordan so far. But I don’t want just 6 years. I want 60 years to spend with him.

I like to think of myself as a strong and independent individual when I’m faced with most difficult situations. I guess I can relate with Jaime about being a mediator and fixing situations when they come along. But the raw hard truth is that we have no control over this particular situation. The only thing I have control over is how my time with Jordan is spent for these last few weeks before he is scheduled to deploy. I only have control over making sure that he knows exactly how I feel about him before he leaves and this is what I put my focus on. I often think about that moment Jordan and I first met and wonder what did I do to deserve that perfect October 13th night?

-posted by Lindsay