Do you ever think about?

A few nights ago I got in a long conversation about exes with Brent. I don't really know how we got on the subject but the idea of the conversation was generally "what was I thinking?" and "I'm so glad I married you!"

It amazes me when I look back on some of the guys I considered. Some weren't that strong in their faith. Some weren't that attractive (hah!). Some weren't interested in having kids. Some weren't attentive. Some weren't leaders. Some were quiet(LOL). I wonder why I even considered some of the guys that I spent significant time with because I thought he "might be the one"

Today, in retrospect, I am thinking about those past friendships... thinking about the boys that wrote me letters from boot camp or coast guard ships. Wondering what my life would have been like - and then shuddering at the thought. What would me life be without Brent and Alina and Raziel? I can't imagine I'd be any kind of happy. What would life have been like if I'd gone to college for 4 years? Gosh, I'd just be graduating.... no kids for sure.

Because of thinking bout this, I wanted to tell you about how Brent and I met and how amazing it is. We were talking about it last night and surely, I've decided, God loves fairy tales and just wanted to make one out of my life for the pure enjoyment of it.

Brent and I were both online kids when we were in our early teens. We both hung out in Christian chat rooms and talked in AIM to complete strangers. (It was before Facebook got big, remember back then?) We used to chat with people about life, God, and stuff in general. It was in this Christian chat room that we met and chatted some. Brent was told by God very early on that I was the woman that he would marry. Well, being that he was like 13 at the time, Brent freaked out and blocked my AIM and didn't talk to me. He figured he must be going crazy and had made things up in his mind. He changed chat rooms and times he was there to avoid me.

A year or so passes and he comes back to the chat room where we met. He runs into me in this chat room several more times, all the while remember vaugely that "this is the woman you'll marry." He unblocks me on AIM for a time and then freaked himself out because he started to think that maybe it was me (or something like that... I'm not sure why he re-blocked me, I hardly remember this part) When we were 15, we hadn't talked for quite a long time and we'd all but forgotten the existence of eachother. Brent's family was going through a tough time (his parents got divorced a few years later) and Brent confided in this guy he had gotten to know online. This guy suggested that Brent just needed to take a week or so and get out of his house. He offered to have Brent come and visit his family, and mentioned that Brent should get to know his little sister who was about Brent's age and was turning 16 the week he'd be coming to visit. When this guy gave Brent the AIM screen name, it was blocked.

That guy was my brother, David. I was the sister. Brent (at this point having purposefully tried to loose me in the sea of the internet twice or more times and being unsucessful) unblocked my screen name and decided to get to know me. This was around December. By March, when spring break came around and Brent's plan to come visit was still in effect, Brent and I had become very very very close and knew that there was something more there. I didn't know that God had told him years before then that I was going to be his wife, but Brent always remembered.

Today, 7 years later, we are still together and very happy and looking back on it is like reading a fairy tale. We dated for about 3 years and got married on the 3 year anniversary of the day that we met in person. We will be celebrating our 4th year of marriage in March when Judah comes. It amazes me that the decisions that we made were so orchestrated that they brought us to where we are today.

Anyways, I just wanted to talk about it some because it brought to my attention how good of a husband I have... and how much God must love me to have to work that hard to bring him to me.