16 years ago today...

16 years ago today I went downtown for Spring Crawl to hang out with some friends. If you were never aware of Spring Crawl, basically all of downtown closed off the streets and you could walk around bar hopping.

I was one month out of a nearly 12 year relationship and this girl was ready to
PAR-TAY!

I had everything planned out.

My routine was dialed in

I had sights on finishing my degree

Getting in the best shape of my life

Creating my “dream” backyard

TOTAL FREEDOM

LIVING

I certainly had no plans for marriage and kids. It will never happen.

Nope.

Hard pass.

Completely off the table.

Yup, I had it all planned out.

It’s funny because mom would always say, “Never say never."
I would just laugh and think “I don’t want this mom, it’s not going to happen.”
 

My friend and I walk into Sunshine Theater simply because all of the other bars were at capacity.
Not long after we get there, my friend points out a guy who also works at Costco.

“Hey, it’s Joey!”
Oh, hello you tall dark and handsome fella, I know you!

We worked together in the bakery for a couple of years and yeah he was so good looking but he annoyed the hell out of me!  Over time, I moved to morning merchandising, he moved to night merchandising and it wasn’t anything out of the ordinary, we just never saw each other and that was that.

Although, someone who still worked in the bakery who saw me as she came in and saw him as she left, kept dropping hints. Looking back, I think she was planting the seeds.

Anyway, we go over, say hi and before we know it, we’re meeting his best friend Ruben and he’s buying us a round of beers. We all hang out the entire night and of course I have to leave because we needed to be to work in about 4 hours.

A week later we started dating

A week later he asked if I wanted to go steady (yeah, he said steady)

Um, nope.

A week later after that he asked if I wanted to go steady

Dude, no. I just got my freedom, I’m not giving that up!

The third week of dating, “will you go steady with me? I promise you, you won’t regret it and I will never hurt you.”

Ugh, ok fine but just know I’m outta here if you do.

4 months later we were engaged. He took my mom for breakfast and asked for her blessing. She told him “I’ve never seen her this happy, of course.”

10 months after that we were married

16 years and two crazy monkeys later, I still accomplished all that I wanted and so much more including what I thought I didn’t and we did it TOGETHER.

Team Grijalva!
 
The lesson in all of this:
When you’re not looking for it or forcing it the best things (or people) come.
When you stop forcing your weight loss
Stop forcing your relationships or controlling them on what you want
Stop forcing something just because someone else is doing it
When you let go of the control of whatever it is you're trying to control, beautiful things happen.

Oh, and moms are always right!

Nourish your purpose now,

Rebecca