Her Side of the Story
What you’re about to read is actually the second version of my side of the story. After I spent a good handful of hours writing our story the first time around in a timeline format I decided to scrap it all and do something a little different. It felt too dry to go through how we met, how we became friends, and how everything happened in chronological order. After all I was trying to condense our 15 year history and that was impossible to do without putting everyone to sleep. Instead I decided to share about a few events that happened over the course of our time together.
One of the earliest memories I have of David was from our freshman year in high school. We had met at church right before high school started and we got to talking a little bit in high school. Truth be told in the very beginning I had a little bit of a crush on him – he was tall (for a Chinese guy), dark, and cute – the kind of stuff a 14 year-old girl looked for. Because we knew each other from church we would occasionally talk between periods and somehow we decided that we would go to our Homecoming dance together. I don’t think either of us actually asked the other person but it kind of just fell into place. Unfortunately (or fortunately?) David got grounded by his grandfather right before Homecoming and we ended up not being able to go. I was terribly bummed at that time. I hadn’t discovered his super outgoing, slightly obnoxious, and overly blunt personality at that time and so I was disappointed about not being able to go to the dance with a cute boy. Looking back now I secretly thank his grandpa and God for not letting us “go out” then – because today our story would probably be pretty different.
Something else that I remember well about us happened several years down the road. At that time whenever David and I would hang out he would share about who he was seeing and how things were going. Now by then I did not have a crush on David anymore. Over the years I discovered how very different our personalities were and I had convinced myself that we could never ever be a couple. For some reason though whenever he would talk about his relationships it would always bother me quite a bit. I always thought that maybe I was just not used to the whole relationship talk – at that point of my life I still had never had a boyfriend and did not “date” at all. I threw myself into school like the nerd that I am and I thought maybe I just didn’t understand his lifestyle. Truthfully I think I was bothered because I did feel something for him but I worked hard at suppressing those feelings. I thought for sure that David could not possibly be the one that God had planned for me so I needed to keep our relationship completely platonic.
Now David and I stayed casual friends pretty much for the first 10 years of our time together. Things really changed for us in 2004 when he came back from Iraq and I was in my second year of vet school. Before he got deployed he had called me up to say goodbye – which was a pleasant surprise and I thought about him a lot and prayed for him while he was gone. So when he got back about a year later and called me up I was totally ecstatic. I couldn’t quite figure out why I was so happy but ever since he came back we became very close. We would take day trips to San Francisco or go shopping together. He often visited me in Davis and we would do everything from going dancing to going out to dinner to just catching movie together. We talked about everything and anything – from our families to our troubles to our then love interests. David always made me feel important and beautiful and I was always very comfortable with him. He was extremely supportive, sensitive, and caring. My buddies in vet school took note of all of these things and would ask again and again why we were not dating. I would always say that David’s too immature, too much of an extrovert, and simply too different from me for us to ever work as a couple. I fought the idea of us even though I loved him dearly as a friend. I was doing the “Jean knows best” thing that I do so well.
Finally in the summer of 2008 - 14 years after we had first met – David somehow pulled himself together and for the first time ever he expressed his feelings for me. Although I had suspected – maybe even secretly wished – that he might have feelings for me David had never actually said anything. Honestly I thought we would stay friends forever because either he never had any romantic feelings for me or he just would never work up the courage to do anything about it. I was wrong. David was persistent and showed me his heart and soul over a period of four months. His sincerity and earnestness touched me so much that I finally stopped thinking that I knew better than he did. And since we officially started dating in November 2008 I never looked back again. Everyday I thank God for how everything took place between us. Because of everything that happened I know David’s weaknesses and short-comings better than anyone else. I also know and cherish his good qualities. I have never met a more genuine person than David. He may not have the filters to say the right things at the right time but he always means what he says. His enthusiasm, however excessive it may seem at times, is always sincere and totally infectious. And after all the years of nagging at him about his spiritual life – I see the work God has done in him and I see that David’s love for God and his desire to be better for God are sincere and true. With each day that I spend with David I respect him and love him more and more. Everyday I am also amazed at how much we have in common and how much alike we actually are. Most of all I am so grateful to have someone who understands me and loves me for who I am. In God’s mysterious way He brought David into my life, gave each of us our own personal trials and triumphs, allowed detours, but finally brought us together. I am thankful for the friend that I have in David, and I can’t wait to spend the rest of my life with him.
One of the earliest memories I have of David was from our freshman year in high school. We had met at church right before high school started and we got to talking a little bit in high school. Truth be told in the very beginning I had a little bit of a crush on him – he was tall (for a Chinese guy), dark, and cute – the kind of stuff a 14 year-old girl looked for. Because we knew each other from church we would occasionally talk between periods and somehow we decided that we would go to our Homecoming dance together. I don’t think either of us actually asked the other person but it kind of just fell into place. Unfortunately (or fortunately?) David got grounded by his grandfather right before Homecoming and we ended up not being able to go. I was terribly bummed at that time. I hadn’t discovered his super outgoing, slightly obnoxious, and overly blunt personality at that time and so I was disappointed about not being able to go to the dance with a cute boy. Looking back now I secretly thank his grandpa and God for not letting us “go out” then – because today our story would probably be pretty different.
Something else that I remember well about us happened several years down the road. At that time whenever David and I would hang out he would share about who he was seeing and how things were going. Now by then I did not have a crush on David anymore. Over the years I discovered how very different our personalities were and I had convinced myself that we could never ever be a couple. For some reason though whenever he would talk about his relationships it would always bother me quite a bit. I always thought that maybe I was just not used to the whole relationship talk – at that point of my life I still had never had a boyfriend and did not “date” at all. I threw myself into school like the nerd that I am and I thought maybe I just didn’t understand his lifestyle. Truthfully I think I was bothered because I did feel something for him but I worked hard at suppressing those feelings. I thought for sure that David could not possibly be the one that God had planned for me so I needed to keep our relationship completely platonic.
Now David and I stayed casual friends pretty much for the first 10 years of our time together. Things really changed for us in 2004 when he came back from Iraq and I was in my second year of vet school. Before he got deployed he had called me up to say goodbye – which was a pleasant surprise and I thought about him a lot and prayed for him while he was gone. So when he got back about a year later and called me up I was totally ecstatic. I couldn’t quite figure out why I was so happy but ever since he came back we became very close. We would take day trips to San Francisco or go shopping together. He often visited me in Davis and we would do everything from going dancing to going out to dinner to just catching movie together. We talked about everything and anything – from our families to our troubles to our then love interests. David always made me feel important and beautiful and I was always very comfortable with him. He was extremely supportive, sensitive, and caring. My buddies in vet school took note of all of these things and would ask again and again why we were not dating. I would always say that David’s too immature, too much of an extrovert, and simply too different from me for us to ever work as a couple. I fought the idea of us even though I loved him dearly as a friend. I was doing the “Jean knows best” thing that I do so well.
Finally in the summer of 2008 - 14 years after we had first met – David somehow pulled himself together and for the first time ever he expressed his feelings for me. Although I had suspected – maybe even secretly wished – that he might have feelings for me David had never actually said anything. Honestly I thought we would stay friends forever because either he never had any romantic feelings for me or he just would never work up the courage to do anything about it. I was wrong. David was persistent and showed me his heart and soul over a period of four months. His sincerity and earnestness touched me so much that I finally stopped thinking that I knew better than he did. And since we officially started dating in November 2008 I never looked back again. Everyday I thank God for how everything took place between us. Because of everything that happened I know David’s weaknesses and short-comings better than anyone else. I also know and cherish his good qualities. I have never met a more genuine person than David. He may not have the filters to say the right things at the right time but he always means what he says. His enthusiasm, however excessive it may seem at times, is always sincere and totally infectious. And after all the years of nagging at him about his spiritual life – I see the work God has done in him and I see that David’s love for God and his desire to be better for God are sincere and true. With each day that I spend with David I respect him and love him more and more. Everyday I am also amazed at how much we have in common and how much alike we actually are. Most of all I am so grateful to have someone who understands me and loves me for who I am. In God’s mysterious way He brought David into my life, gave each of us our own personal trials and triumphs, allowed detours, but finally brought us together. I am thankful for the friend that I have in David, and I can’t wait to spend the rest of my life with him.
We love because He first loved us. 1 John 4:19
