Keep your Personal Journals & Save your Emails – Priceless Moments
A Continuation of Milestone Moment: The Secret to Preserving Memories (How I Met My Wife). Read the previous blogs in the category called: Meeting the Love of your Life.
My time with my nieces is precious! I never seem to have enough. When I am with them, the time flies by and it is over too soon. This time was a little different though. I was actually spending 9 days with them, so it seemed like it went slower. On Sunday morning, they were all getting ready for church, and I decided to check my email. It had been several days and I really wanted to know if FaithfulGodChaser had sent me an email. To be honest, I really didn’t expect it. In my mind, I was thinking about all the reasons that I had given her not to email me. You see, I had told the truth about my life. . . I told her about being divorced and expected that a “good girl” like her would not be interested in even a friendship with someone like me. I was shocked when I opened my email . . . There it was.
I had butterflies in my stomach as I opened it up. What would it say? Would she be kind? Would she tell me to go away? I began to read her email. I didn’t even realize until later that I was biting my bottom lip with anticipation. After reading a paragraph, I looked to see if this was a short or a long email . . . To my pleasant surprise, it was huge! It took me about 30 minutes to finish reading the email. As I was closing it down, my youngest niece, Sydni, (Spelled, S-Y-D-N-I-With a dot! You do not forget her dot, or she will not be happy with you!) asked me what I was doing. I told her that I was reading an email from a girl I just met online. Even at the age of 4, she understood what this meant and she made sure the whole house knew! Uncle Mark has a girlfriend! Uncle Mark has a girlfriend!
While my relationship with the girl I now knew as Marcie was far from being a “real relationship” the taunts from the children in the house went on all day. “Mark and Marcie, sitting in a tree, K-I-S-S-I-N-G!” We all know the song. We have all sung it at one point in our lives. I must admit, it is a little different when you are a grown man, hearing these childhood taunts. It had been 6 or 7 years since I had been in any kind of relationship, and it felt good to know that this was even a possibility.
It took me a couple of days to find the time to email her back. I stayed up late on the last night that I was there in order to send a response. I needed to think without all the tormenting from my favorite girls in the world. I carefully answered her questions and posed a few of my own. This girl seemed to have a lot of things in common with me. She was not interested in a romantic relationship, and frankly, neither was I. This was my first attempt after being divorced. There was still a lot of hurt there. While emailing with her was fun, it also brought up a lot of hurt and pain.
I drove home in quiet reflection of the email I had received while there. I thought about who this person is and what she had said. I knew in my heart that we would be good friends. I knew that God had brought her into my life for a reason. I knew that my life would never be the same just because we had talked. But I didn’t know how true those thoughts really were . . .
It would be interesting to journal about my anxiety levels (as they were very high at this point in our relationship), and watch them fall as I got to know my future wife better. Now that is a journal that would be helpful to read to my future child, to explain what it is like meeting “the one” you will marry eventually. What a fun journal to save in a time capsule. Let’s face it, it can be scary meeting someone we do not know, let alone someone online. Here is a helpful website to help you write your first (milestone moment) email back to that special someone, like I did. Check out these tips at http://www.match.com/magazine/article/8753/Send-A-Standout-Email/.
Have fun getting to know each other. Remember it is important to be friends first. Start your life story of how you met with a journal like this at https://www.etsy.com/listing/130915450/memories-from-the-day-we-met-5-x-7?ref=market. Save this journal in your Wedding Time Capsule, to open up years later (like at your 25th Anniversary) to read again, and cry or laugh together as you reminisce. Save your emails you write back and forth together, as you get to know each other, then read them years later after you get married. What a milestone moment that day will be for you both, as you reminisce and reflect on what life was like the year you first met or emailed each other.
Where did you first meet your spouse? Comment below. We love to hear your stories too.
Making Milestone Moments Count,
www.timecapsule.com