Shanspirations

Jacob and I were fifteen years old when we met each other Fall 1992. Jacob just showed up one day at the small Christian highschool where I attended. I happened to be taking pictures of all my classmates that day and since I had included everyone else I also took a picture of Jacob—the first day I met him.

Though I knew nothing of Jacob that day we met, his family had lived in seven cities and towns prior to moving to upstate NY where I lived. His father was (and is) a construction manager and for a long time the company had focused on constructing hospitals.  This had resulted in a lot of moving for Jacob’s family as his father needed to relocate each time to oversee a new hospital construction.

For months after Jacob came to my school, we had little conversation. We didn’t have—on the surface—much in common. I liked poetry and writing and, though quiet, abounded full of idealism and excitement for life. Jacob seemed born to be an engineer and struck me as calm, easygoing and also quiet.

When we had to choose topics for an English research paper that year, Jacob choose something technical while I choose something “interesting.” Or so I thought, until I teased Jacob about his “boring” choice of topic and he began to describe why it interested him. He had an amazing talent for explaining topics that I had considered dull in ways that flushed out what made them interesting and alive.

On the other hand, when I expressed my delight in the simple beauty of the lilacs I looked forward to blooming each spring, I was able to help him appreciate simple joys of life in a new way.

One day while out for a class trip to a large public library to work on our research papers, Jacob and I sat across from each other and talked. As he told me some of his experiences moving across the country, I began to think his life had been very interesting. Perhaps mine had been dull by comparison.

The more we talked, the more Jacob showed me a side of life I’d never seen and the more I revealed a perspective new to him. We also discovered a mutual appreciation for books and reading and for thinking deeply about our lives, the world around us, and the things we believed important.

On a mild spring day in April 1993 sitting outside on the steps of our school at lunchtime, Jacob asked me to be his girlfriend. When I agreed, I don’t think either of us had an inkling of what we were truly doing.

In the months and years to come, when we would argue, and when maintaining the relationship would get tough, both of us were by nature such non-quitters that we would invariably choose to work out our difficulties rather than breaking up. In this way we managed to stay best friends and still dating through the remainder of our tenth grade year, eleventh grade, twelfth grade, and our first two years of college.

When we hit college, things grew very challenging. Jacob went away to college in Ohio and I to Florida. In the meanwhile, Jacob’s family moved to Missouri. Suddenly we went from being high school sweethearts to barely seeing one another. As we both had to work and struggle to pay for our schooling, even the cost of calling each other long distance was something we could barely manage.

I wanted the chance to get to know some other guys on my college campus and Jacob agreed to this, never telling me at the time how much it troubled him. I quickly discovered that no one held a candle to Jake for me. This time of casual dating confirmed to me that Jacob was not only my best friend but the one I could be absolutely myself with, yet it also added to the strain were were experiencing.

In addition to the difficulty of the long-distance relationship, Jacob and I were both faced with spiritual and moral questions that we were each separately pondering. I had believed on Christ in college and was now considering my life in light of what would please God.

I knew that Jacob had always been so absorbingly important to me that I had given God only a backdoor key to my heart. I worried that as long as we were together, it might never be any different. Jacob, who had trusted Christ in high school, was facing similar concerns and also some concerns entirely different.

The result was that on August 30, 1997, Jacob and I broke up with each other. Both of us would say it was the hardest thing we ever had to do, and yet both of us would also say that at the time we were certain it was the only right thing we could do. The consequences of our breakup were many. We spent the next four and a half years apart from each other, always in different cities and not so much as calling or writing each other except for a few times at first.

We learned that life without each others’ friendship was like a different world. Every time Jacob saw a lilac he thought of me. Each time I received my monthly subscription to Scientific American I thought of him.

During those first years apart, our faith become the most important thing in life to us. For me it was because life seemed empty without Jake and no friend or hobby could fill the void.  Only the reality of God’s love for me brought lasting comfort and I spent hours each week pouring over the Bible to learn what God had to say to me and praying to tell Him all that was in my heart to say to Him. I was amazed by the peace and joy those times alone with God brought.

Also I began to develop deeper and more lasting and strong friendships with roomates and other friends at college. My friend Lisa P. was a lifesaver to me. She listened when I felt bitterness toward Jacob and taught me forgiveness and love. Brandy Caprice was brightness. Mirren and Taryn were strength. Lauren sharpened my convictions about right and wrong and the way I would choose to live. Lisa N. brought wonderful conversations about eternity and hope and the mystery of getting to have a relationship with the God who had created the universe. Julie made me laugh about life and classes and everything and prayed with me, too. Kristine was fresh air and brightness and hope, a listener and friend who always cared.

Jacob, too, during this time, plunged himself into Bible reading, activities with friends, prayer, church, and seeking a deeper walk with God. He met with other believers for prayer and studying the Bible and also had weekly one-on-one time with a Christian Bible Fellowship missionary who helped him study issues of the Bible in depth. This was life-changing for him.

During the four(+) years after our breakup, Jacob and I knew very little of what happened in each others’ lives. When Jacob lived for a time in Dallas, I only found out because I ran into an old mutual friend of ours who had recently received an email from Jake. Occasionally I received a letter from Jacob’s mother telling how the whole family was doing with a little blurb about Jacob. This was how I learned he had graduated from college with his electrical engineering degree and was considering job opportunities in three different states.

I, too, had graduated and I had found work back home where I also helped in children’s Sunday school, choir, bus ministry, and had become very involved in my church.

One day after it had been four years, I found myself really missing Jacob.  It was September 11th, 2001. In the sorrow I felt over our nation’s tragedy, I immediately wanted to be near my mom, my dad, my brother, and—to my surprise—Jacob. I wanted the old friendship that had been so comforting and accepting. I remembered laughing with him when we iceskated together.  I remembered the playfulness we’d shared through myriads of experiences together and it was hard to believe we’d been parted so long.

I had missed Jacob many times over the years, but had believed the breakup to be final. This day, after an amount of time that seemed unbridgeable, I dared think of praying otherwise. I would not call Jacob. I had decided long ago I never would. But in the weeks and months after September 11th, I prayed that God would bring us together—out of nowhere, as it were—that He would do for us what seemed impossible.

On October 25th I received a phone call from my dad who sounded very surprised. “Jacob [insert last name]…called me today. He wanted to know if you might be open to him calling you.”  My dad had told him yes! Four days later my phone rang (I’d been out-of-town those four days and had no cell phone, so he couldn’t reach me until I returned home). It was Jacob. He wanted to take me to lunch and…(pounding heart)…talk about whether we might consider a relationship.

The following weekend he made the four hour drive from where he was now living and we saw each other again for the first time.

It was an amazing experience, indescribable, really, to see each other for the first time after so many years. At the Olive Garden over soup and salad that neither of us could even manage to eat, we talked about what we had done in our years apart, how we had changed, what our goals were, and what mattered to us.

To our amazement at God’s goodness, we had more in common now than ever before and a passion for Christ we’d not shared those years ago. Jacob began to travel that four hour trip to see me every single weekend.

On March 23, 2002, he asked me to marry him at the very park where we had parted ways four and a half years ago. I thought the way he asked me to marry him was the best ever. We had gone to see the tree where he’d carved our initials as high-schoolers. When he got down on one knee to ask me to marry him, I could hardly believe it was happening.

Perhaps most meaningful of all were the 36 vases of roses spread all about my and my mom’s apartment when Jacob and I got back (He had enlisted help from my family for this).  For attached to each vase was a card with a little letter. In each of the letters, Jacob had written specific things he loved about me and dreams he had for our life together (things like going camping or having our first child, so many things ahead, even down to growing old together). I cherish those 36 dream-filled mini love letters and will always.

September 14, 2002, we were married in my home church, the church we had attended together in highschool. It was a dream-come-true, joy-filled day.

Jacob and I have a special saying we use a lot to describe what it’s like being together again after our years apart. We tell each other, “you’re the sweater that fits.”

If you’ve ever had one article of clothing that fit you utterly perfectly and you felt more at home wearing it than anything else in your closet, maybe you’ll identify with what I mean by saying that for me he is the perfect fit. Every other man I ever knew, no matter how handsome or how nice, would have been like an ill-fitting sweater that just made me feel uncomfortable compared to what it’s like in my relationship with Jacob.

We are both so very thankful God gave us back to each other.