Our Story - Part 3

(To catch up on Our Story, click here)

The first time I knew that Matt was probably seeing a girl was on one of the nights that he did not join us for supper.  He was eating supper at the same time, but was with this girl and a couple of her friends.  I won't lie - I was greatly disappointed.  And it was after that that I started seeing them together often.  And then, one night when we were at dinner, he asked me and Betsey what kind of flowers he should get for this girl for our upcoming Fine Arts.  (Fine Arts was a formal that we went to several times a year.  It was either a play, opera, or classical concert and everyone was required to wear formal attire, and it was a "big" date opportunity for most people.)  When he asked that all my hopes were suddenly dashed and I silently reprimanded myself for even thinking there would have ever been a possibility that he would even consider me as anything more than just a girl who he goes to supper with sometimes.  I begrudgingly gave him my advice about the flowers. ;-)

At this point, we are about halfway through the fall semester.  It is important to the story line that I insert a few side notes.  First of all, this was the year that I had the best roommates of all my time at school.  We all got along great and did lots of stuff together.  We prayed together often, and just had fun together. Well, apparently my roomies "took pity" on me because I was not dating anyone.  They seemed to think that I was "too good" (their words by the way, NOT mine! :-) ) to not be snatched up by some guy.  So, they started to pray together for this specific area.  They would pray at night after lights out before they fell asleep.  They were able to do this without my knowledge because one of my duties as RA was to help with lights out, so I was often out and did not come to bed until after midnight.  So while I was busily working, they were upstairs in my dorm room having what they called E.P.T. - "Emily Prayer Time."  The were praying specifically for God to lead me and my husband to each other, and that, if God willed, He would do it soon.

Then, one night in the middle of the semester they went out to eat at a Chinese restaurant.  For some reason (other than the fact that I don't like Chinese food) I was unable to join them.  While there, they decided to take home a fortune cookie for me - just for fun.  They came back and gave me the cookie.  I must insert here that I am definitely NOT a believer in fortune tellers and stuff like that!  So they gave me the cookie, and I opened it up.  I read the fortune and kinda snickered to myself - sorta like, "Yeah, right!"

"What's it say?" They asked.   So I read it to them.  "It says, 'Love is just around the corner.'  Ha. Whatever."  I was about to set it down when suddenly they were all smiling so big, and my one roomie, Jenn, was jumping up and down, holding my wrists and saying, "Oh my goodness!  You have no idea!  Oh my goodness!"  I looked at her and told her to calm down, that it was just a silly piece of paper.  But the rest of the night they all were giggling and acting so strangely.  I now know that they were just too excited because that is exactly how they had been praying and almost saw it as a sign from God.  I don't know about that, but I still look back at it and think it is kinda neat!

Okay, another thing to know is on Matt's end.  I guess his "relationship" with this girl was not going quite like it "should" have been, and it seemed that things were winding down and coming to an end.  Of course, I was totally unaware of this.

So now, back to the story line.  I was firmly determined to get all thoughts of Matthew Sealy out of my mind.  I am a believer in not dwelling on things that we cannot have and such.  It only makes you bitter, complaining, and discontent.  So I was praying with ALL MY MIGHT that the Lord would remove these feeling from my heart.  I had done this before with other boys that I thought I was interested in, and every time, God had answered my prayers and my feelings had always disappeared.  But not so this time.  My feelings only got stronger and stronger with each meeting with him.  I couldn't understand why the Lord was not helping me with this like he had before.  So I was really struggling.

At this point, I believe I had only told one person about my feelings, and that was my friend, Wendy.  She advised me to be careful because she knew he was dating someone at the time and I should guard my heart, which is what I was trying to do.  But other than her - no one knew - not even my roommates who were fervently praying for me (which I would not know about for quite some time).   So here I was, desperately trying to not focus on NOT liking Matt - yet seeing him often in class and having meals with him and ending up liking him even more.  I just wasn't sure what to do or how to handle this.  And things progressed much like they had been all semester until one "fateful" Monday night near the end of November.

The night Betsey and I went out for breadsticks...

Until next time...