Episode #2

The tent was taken down and PB left on a bus headed north.  We wrote a flurry of letters back and forth across the miles, but, alas, adolescent infatuation didn’t survive the distance.  I discovered there were cute boys right in my own high school. He had cute girls after him in his own hometown.

One day PB called from the phone booth, ready for a long conversation with his pocket full of dimes.

“What have you been doing?”

“I went out with Dan the other night.”

“Dan…..your brother?”

“No.”

After that we didn’t talk, didn’t write, didn’t see each other for two years. He was mad.

During those years of silence, I began to pray for God to show me who I was going to marry.  I don’t know why.  It seemed important to me when I was a sophomore in high school to fervently seek His will concerning my future mate.  My thoughts often took me up north to the cute pastor’s son who played his harmonica outside my bedroom window.  PB had all the right qualities: 1) he believed in God, 2) he could sing, 3) he was cute.

One day, a letter arrived and the silence was broken.  He was going to be in the area and would like to stop by and say hello.  The fervent prayers picked up.  “Lord, if he’s the one You’ve picked out for me, make him say something about marriage when he comes.”  Lord have mercy.

He came and we spent the afternoon together.  When he got ready to leave, he started up his candy apple red 1969 Chevy Chevelle Malibu with a black vinyl top, and said, “Someday I’m going to marry you.”   Then he drove away.

I was 16 years old and I knew he was the one.