February 05, 2013 Linsay Cheney

lcheney@connectstatesboro.com

    Let’s get personal for a minute.
    The first conversation I had with the man who quickly would become the love of my life was last spring — on Easter Sunday afternoon, to be exact.
    Back then, he had a job that required him to wake up at 4 a.m., but that didn’t stop him from talking on the phone with me through the early morning hours each day over the next few weeks.
    It only took a few days for me to sense that this was special — he was special — and I couldn’t stop myself from telling my closest friends and family about what was happening. Some of them thought it was cute. A few were excited, and a few were convinced I had lost my mind.
    We thought we had lost our minds. It was moving too fast. We didn’t even know each other. Love just doesn’t happen like this.
    But we were wrong. Sometimes love does happen like that, especially when you’re not expecting it — and boy, was I not expecting it. In fact, I had almost convinced myself that the man I had been praying for all those years may simply have been a figment of my imagination. Perhaps, after so much time as a single lady, I had come to expect something or someone too good to be true: a man who is both gentle and strong, silly yet sentimental; a man who can handle and understand my sense of humor and who laughs with me; a man who respects my independence but provides a soft place for me to fall, who allows me to be myself and accepts me completely for who I am.
    I was seriously considering life in a nunnery.
    And believe me, those doubts didn’t  immediately go away when I met the exact man I had been looking for. I’d always said I had faith that God would one day introduce me to the man that would make this whole thing worth the wait — but when God did just that, I realized how little faith I truly had.
    I was afraid. I couldn’t believe this man was real. I was waiting for the other shoe to drop and shatter it all.
    It’s been almost a year, however, and no shoes have fallen from the sky. God has truly blessed me, despite my lack of faith, with a man who opens doors and pushes shopping carts, sings in the shower and tells me I’m beautiful; loves my family and my dogs, hugs me after a long day and calls just to say “I love you.” He prays with me, laughs with me, dances and cooks with me, and when that handsome thing gives me that wink of his, my heart just melts. I’m in love, and I can’t wait to spend forever with my man.
    Not long after the love bug bit, one of my friends told me she was looking forward to reading my column in the next Valentine’s Day issue, sure that my views on the sappy holiday would change.
    She was correct — kind of.
    The jewelry store commercials that begin running before I’ve even had a chance to take down my Christmas decorations still annoy me. The boxes of yucky, nougat-filled chocolates and the absurdly large stuffed animals that belong in a booth at the county fair still annoy me. The fat, naked baby with a bow and arrow still annoys me, and the unrealistic expectations and false hopes that people magically will transform into Prince Charmings and Sleeping Beauties just because the calendar says so — yup, those still annoy me, too.
    And I still can’t stand it when people feel sorry for their friends who are single on V-Day. The truth is that they don’t need pity because, believe it or not, even as single guys or gals, I’m pretty certain their lives are full of love — and I’m living proof that there’s always room for more, even when you’re least expecting it.
    As always, I’m going to take time this V-Day to appreciate all those people who have invested in a piece of my heart’s real estate. Lucky for me, there’s just one more amazing investor to add to that list this year, because "I have found him whom my soul loves" (Song of Solomon 3:4).

    Linsay Cheney is the editor of Connect Statesboro. Get in touch with her at lcheney@connectstatesboro.com.

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