In the last 24-36 hours, we have run pretty much the entire course of human emotion. We went from missing each other because we weren't able to spend Valentine's day together, to happiness when your flowers began to bloom, and finally with you being upset and disappointed in me for making the decision to drop the letter in your parents' mailbox.
While I don't regret the decision to leave the letter and finally share my feelings with your parents, I do regret the level of emotional damage that it has done to us. After I got out of class yesterday afternoon, I literally called every rental car location in Illinois from Alton all the way down to Fairview in hopes of being able to leave right then to come see you and try to make everything better. When none of those options worked, I even got online to look at flights to Chicago. Unfortunately, the $300 price tag and a fear of getting up there and you not wanting to pick me up at the airport or see me at all kept me from finalizing the trip.
I've been thinking about whether the decision to leave the letter was a good one or not. I feel amazingly at peace about it because of the sequence of events. We've talked several times before about the fact that we don't believe in coincidence. Very rarely do I ever have text or notebooks in my bag when I'm driving. My staple items in my backpack when I'm working are my Bible, pens, flashlight, gloves, extra clothes, CD's, and some bottled water and snacks for the trip. If I had packed my flashlight in my bag, I could have stopped at any point along the side of the road to fix the problems that I was having with the truck. If I hadn't had my notebook with me that had the copy of the letter, we wouldn't be having these discussions. And of all of the places on that 450-mile route for the truck to be stupid, it happened just before exit 9 on I-72. That unique set of circumstances would not have occurred if any one of those factors had been different, but they weren't.
Ever since I wrote the first draft of this letter about a month ago, I feel that God has placed it on my heart to make the decision to send it to your parents. I really feel like He's been telling me that if I'm going to be the man I'm supposed to be in His, our families', and your eyes, I needed to step up to the plate. I needed to be able to trust in what He tells me to do in my life, and trust that He will provide for me/us in the ways that are going to benefit us most in His purpose. If we're going to succeed as a couple, we also need to know that at the most stressful times in our lives when we have to make hard decisions, that the other one will be there to support us in our decisions.
Matthew chapter 5, verses 22-33 in our Bibles says it in terms of husbands and wives, but I think this can apply to us as well:
"Wives, submit to your husbands as to the Lord. For the husband is the head of the wife as Christ is the head of the church, his body, of which he is the Savior. Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit to their husbands in everything."
"Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her to make her holy: cleansing her by the washing with water through the word, and to present her to himself as a radiant church, without stain or wrinkle or any other blemish, but holy and blameless. In the same way, husbands ought to love their wives and their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself. After all, no one ever hated his own body, but he feeds and cares for it, just as Christ does the church: for we are members of his body."
"For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife and the two will become one flesh. This is a profound mystery, but I am talking about Christ and the church. However, each one of you also must love his wife as he loves himself and the wife must respect her husband."
I know that we're far from the actual husband and wife stage of our relationship, but if we build that mutual respect and understanding, I think that we will be blessed. This includes us making difficult decisions when we feel like they are necessary, and sticking by each other as much as possible.
The past two years have been some of the happiest of my life. I would like to find out for sure, but I really think that even in the beginning, people may have made some incorrect assumptions about the validity of our relationship. I obviously made the biggest mistake of my life, and almost lost you right then. That's a feeling that I don't ever want to feel again. Our relationship has been far from normal for the last two years, but it's been a time of significant growth. The biggest thing that I have lacking in my life right now is the ability to have a normal and open relationship with you.
Right now it might seem to you like an inconsiderate and selfish decision was made for all the wrong reasons. Hopefully by the end of this week, things will be different. Only time will tell how this will actually work out, but I very firmly believe that there are no such things as coincidences.
This is my love letter to you, it changes every day...
