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Seventeen years in the making......(9/30/1989)
September 30, 2006
Years ago...9/30
Seventeen years ago, I was sixteen. I was raging full of hormones. I was inlove with the fantasy of going to the prom. I met my now husband. We were in 11th grade. I met him in the guidance office on friday afternoon, shortly after he transfered to my public high school.
I went to innercity public high school. The schools were bad but not henious. I beleive they've gone down hill from there. DH had moved in with his dad/grandmother's home, away from his mom whom he had grown up with.
I was working in the guidance office and he stopped in to complain about something. I can remember down to his bugle boy jeans. He liked hip hop and wore cargo pants. I had fluffy bangs and listened to REM and INXS. I had a serious love for REM back then.
We attended the same english and history class. I spent my mornings in a vocational education program because my mom didn't think I'd go to college. So, having some business skills helped, right. Now, I went to school in the raging GHETTO. Yes, I typed that right. The Ghetto! Full with drug dealers, crack heads, and people who had lost hope in life. The school was tucked in the ghetto. In between crack houses, boarded up drug houses, houses that had be blown up with moltov cocktails. I spent two years in this infested ghetto getting a technical business education. In retrospect, I should have attended the college prep programs since that's where I ended up going after high school.
So, I met my husband on a Friday afternoon. I thought about him all weekend. He had a tight brush cut haircut, wore drakkar colonge, had spending money, black and white british knights that weighed atleast 30 pounds, bugle boy cargo pants, and some bugle boy top. It's funny how much I remember.
We had our first date "hanging out", on a saturday which was 9/30/89. I wanted a prom date, he wanted to get frisky. We met at the local hood mall, which I rode the public bus to. He and I spent many hours on the bus. We ate at arbys and hung out. He came back to my house and had spaghetti with homemade sauce and never left. He went home on the bus that night and we talked all night on the telephone. We got together the next day and the rest was history.
My expectation of our dating was to have a prom date. My birthday was the same day of the prom. We made plans to attend the prom. I slowly became close with him. We'd spend time together, hanging out. I worked part time at mcdonalds and he did something. I remember we'd hang out on the weekends and the days would seem soooo long.....
Senior year of high school we celebrated 1 year of dating, wow, it was a huge deal. HE had gotten great scores on his SAT's and was on the fast track the his top choice of college. I on the other hand went to a prep program for college to compensate for the education deficincies I had.
I went to college in the ghetto. I couldn't beleive how bad it was. I remember one of my costudents' father was murdered minutes from the campus. While he sat in lecture, his father was fighting for his life. He was murdered by a crack head. Sadly, this family lost their father and their sense of wellbeing. His mom suffered and I don't know if he went on to graduate college.
We passed through college, I was always waiting for us to break up. Things continued and kept moving forward. Year after year passed. Approx 2 years later my mom had a major heart attack which lead to open hear surgery. I was scared to death. I was almost facing the first of many 'grown' up crisis. My family was there, but I wasn't. I couldn't deal with my mom being sick. I still attended school. I rememeber my advisor withdrew me from my courses because of the stress of my situation. I was very displeased with that. I tried to break up with Dh during this time. He was being insensitive and selfish and always worried about himself. At my mom's encouragement I gave him a second chance. WE got back together and myh mom was very happy for this.
He later became an invaluable resource when my mom became fully disabled and bed ridden.
I have written about her illness' before, but during this time, my family became more scarce.
The people who were always there for me, were not chosing to put myself or my mother first.
I am the youngest of 7 kids. Everyone always fell on me and decided I'd always be there.
This continued for several years.
Around college graduation marriage started swirling around me. His cousin had gotten married, his other cousin and my brother were engaged, I was getting the 'engagement' bug. I had it bad.
I decided that when I graduated college, with my business degree, that I would attend a graduate program, live at home with mom, and break up with him due to his lack of committment. This saga continued a bit.
I remember going to the Bahama's on spring break and missing him insanely. He was checking on my mom and helping her while I was on the tropical island. Our lives were slowly intertwining to much resistnace.
Finally, at my 25th birthday his mom let it slip that he was proposing. My birthday is always around mother's day and this particular year it was on Monday. So, she blew it. I didn't know exactly what or when he was going to propose. I was very excited. I got a beautiful 1 carat heart shaped diamond ring. He didn't propose on one knee because of the element of surprise being ruined. I couldn't get anything out, except, it's so big... I was inlove with my ring.
We shared it with my famliy, etc.
Needless to say, I wasn't going to grad school. I decided that I was through with living with my mom, who became a total psycho and cried to my then finance. He took me into his life and promised to finally get me out of the emotional termoil that always existed in my life.
In June, we said good bye to my mom and got an apartment. I also had to get a fulltime job to pay my bills. The excitement was wonderful, my mom was totally hateful during this time.
She was very jealous and was refusing to speak with me due to me moving out. It's like, come on now, i'm 25, and I've never lived on my own.
Sadly, our engagement triumph was overshadowed with the devistation of his dad passing away.
He was 49 and not sick. He died in July, it was the worse time of my entire life. His family didn't accept me into their family because we were not married, however, I was his family.
His mother was even kind enough to make the journey to come to his dad's funeral. She was shuned by his dad's family. It's amazing that a mother's love is so strong she could put her son over her feelings. I grew up very quickly during this time. His family treated me as an outsider, however, my mom encouraged me to be there for him, after all I was becoming his family. I helped him through this hard time. WE had a wedding to plan, however, my finance was disengaged over his tradgedy.
I rememeber finding my wedding gown the day after we got engaged. I bought it and it fit wonderfully. I even got my veil that day too. I brought them home and they sat in the closet for a long time. I don't condone living together before marriage, however, I knew that this was going to result in a marriage. I would never live with and support someone whom I wasn't going to marry. We did stupid stuff, like buy a car together, get a lease together, and many other things. Ofcourse, we stood the test and survived.
After our crisis with his dad dying, we were no stronger, or weaker, just more grown up.
Life was incredibuly unfair. He never spoke of his father nor did he spend the time to grieve.
I couldn't push it on him and he didn't really want to hear of it.
He inherited alot of money. He spent his money wrecklessly. His dream was to buy a home theather, so off to many trips we went to buy things. This was his thearphy.
He purchased a full home theater, including a 60 inch television which we enjoy to this day.
He purchased all the furniture we were lacking for our new apartment. My favorite furniture was our sleigh bed. My husband is totally unselfish and he shared his windfall.
We eventually did the following with the money he inherited -
bought georgous wedding bands each with 1 carat of diamonds
paid for an extravagent european honeymoon for 17 days
paid for awsome pictures
paid for our entire wedding.
paid for our move to NC...
The rest is history, I need to get back to my school work. Next week we will celebrate 7 years of marriage. I couldn't be happier...
JT
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