The Day I Met You

I had only been in my new town for a few weeks when I was invited to my first college football tailgate. I was sitting in a coffee shop with a chai latte and a post traumatic growth workbook when my new friend’s husband kindly insisted I should join. I was really embracing a work-in-progress persona as I bookmarked my page, took another sip of early fall spices and cautiously accepted the invitation. I didn’t know it at the time, but this invitation was part of the plan. His plan.

I just needed to say yes.

I heard it was intensely spirited, but could not have possibly anticipated the passion that which is a college football game day. I had one week to find proper attire in home team colors. And not just any red. Garnet red. My Amazon cart took a hard left from self-help books and moving supplies to garnet red, flowy fall dresses and plaid. I decided on a sleeveless top layered with a fall flannel comfortably tied at the waste, as temps were expected to drop by nightfall. A not quite 40-something, but also not a 20-something, college game day look. This felt good. I felt good.

On the morning of, I was one text away from calling the entire day off. I stood in front of the mirror and saw fingernails that had not been manicured in weeks. I cringed with insecurity as I pulled my old tennis shoes out of the closet. My hair was strategically placed in a pony tail, as I had yet to find a new salon to cover my roots. I stressed over picking the wrong shade of red, and feared I would be completely outcasted as an obvious transplant the moment I stepped out of my vehicle. I picked up my phone to send an obscure, I have a headache text, and my sweet Aunt was calling. A brave woman who led by example and long before my own battles began, on how to fight the good fight of choosing faith in survival. She was so excited for me. For all of it. The move, the job, and the opportunity to meet new friends that day. It was a warm embrace of a call. I hung up and took in the sun rays that were now trickling in through my apartment windows. And with every ounce of my being, I felt God say, Go. You never know who you are going to meet.

I pulled up to my new friends house and was the last of the group to arrive. I applied a soft shade of rose to my lips and a confident smile. I left the now mild concerns of wrong-color-red and old tennis shoes in the backseat of my car. I gave myself permission to not be newly-divorced me. I gave myself permission to embrace an entirely new version of me, in a new place, with new faces. I gave myself permission to not be defined by my story, and tossed that chapter in the backseat for the day as well. I followed my friend up to her dreamy house, delicately traced by maturely bloomed trees, string lights and a pair of dog faces resting in the front window. And then I saw him. He was standing on the front porch with a cooler at his feet.

And I noticed him.

To be transparent, dear partner, I did not notice, men. I may have been in my new red top and embracing unmanicured nails for the day, but was still zipped tight from head to toe in the boundaries that kept me safe. I walked up to the front porch and held out my hand for an introduction, while simultaneously convincing myself he was married. He definitely had a few kids at home. And the day resumed.

We arrived to the sea of garnet red, cowgirl boots, and interlaced scents of mid-fall leaves and meat smoking, in a dirt field of faces that were not familiar, but also felt as if I had known them for years. And I would find myself next to him. I found myself returning to conversation with front porch man.

He had kind eyes that radiated a confident, present soul. His eye contact was unwavering. This was nearly too much for me, as my boundaries didn’t account for kind, present, eye contact. He was not married. He had no kids at home. And it was the first time in many years that I was relaxed in one on one conversation with a man.

As night descended, the temperatures dropped and I reached for my perfectly planned fall flannel, a well-known and romantically deep country song began to play in our background. I watched, in a field of grown, football-loving men, as they grabbed their partners one-by-one and twirled them around under a November, southern sky. It was a really sweet moment. Front porch man and I were the only two not dancing, and I both asked and gave him my permission to twirl me around. I remember touching his hand for the first time, as I described a love for how old couples dance. One arm out and the other at their partner’s side. I remember him telling me someone should show me around my new town and take me to the best restaurants. I remember giving him my number, entranced in childlike memories of slow dancing and asking God, how did I get here? And this felt good. I gave myself permission to just feel the goodness of this moment.

What I love most about this day, wasn’t just this meeting. It was showing up to this meeting as an unmanicured, old tennis shoe-wearing, hair pulled back, imperfectly embraced version of myself, and he saw me.

I told front porch man I would have a date with him.

I told him I was healing.

I told him I had a story.

We can unpack that. He said.

And he’s been faithfully, consistently, meeting me exactly where I am at ever since.