So before I met Eric I had only really had one serious relationship in my life. It was long. It was not bad and not great. I did "love" him. And I thought I would never love again. They always say that your first love is the strongest and that was not true for me because I didn't know God. I had such a small view of what love was. But nonetheless, I found myself very interested in Eric but I was very scared to love someone again because the only time I had ever done that ended in heartbreak. My heart was on lockdown. I was "guarding my heart" like none other and it felt like the right time for me to actually let someone in even if it was scary....
MMMkay... so where was I?
"I really wish you didn't live in Vancouver."
I went back to Vancouver the next day and Eric texted me.. we texted every day since then. And then he got Skype. So we Skyped every day. For reals. Every day. He gave me a tour of his house. I had to skype him from my storage closet at times because there were 3 of us living in a 1 bedroom apartment. #vancouverproblems. During that week I was very excited and also scared. I had butterflies ALL. THE. TIME. I could hardly sleep or eat. There is SO MUCH PRESSURE when you're dating and you're Christian. I felt like I had to KNOW if he was the one I was going to marry before I could even officially date him. It was silly but I DID feel like God was leading me because I never would have considered anything with Eric if I hadn't felt that God was guiding me, and I might not have ever met him if I hadn't been called to be a camp counselor that year!
Anyways one week of Skype dates later and he asked me to come visit him. :O
So I had NO IDEA what I was going to wear. Mahkeela definitely helped me out. For the year that I got to live with her she was basically my personal stylist. I had this cute little jean onesie that I had bought recently so I wore that. And I wore this cute little sparkly bow in my hair and flip flops. I wore my brothers flannel shirt over top and like... I thought I looked pretty cute!! BUT APPARENTLY when Eric saw me in his mind he was like... "I can fix that." Haha WOW right!?!?!
It was my first time riding the ferry and the bus into town by myself. I don't know how I got so brave. I just was. He told me to get off at "Uptown" and I was like.... K. I had no idea where that was so I was following GPS like crazy. And then I saw a sign that said uptown and I saw him sitting up on this super high ledge that only tall people could sit on casually and he had two starbucks drinks in his hands.
I was thinking about hugging him for so long. I was wondering if I could even hug him at all because he was so incredibly tall. He is 6'7" and I am 5'4" (if he could pipe up right now he would correct me and say that I am 5'3 and a half ) so basically I am armpit height. But when I finally got off the bus and quickly walked to him it was seriously the nicest hug in the world, you guys. I was heartbeat height. And I squeezed him extra hard because I'M A HUGGER.
He handed me a peach green tea lemonade and he was drinking a cool lime refresher and we wandered to the parking lot to his car. He then took me to Beacon Hill Park and we wandered around with the ducks. He was wearing blue jeans and a black v neck and black shoes. He bought me this really awesome swirl cone ice cream at the park and we wandered towards the petting zoo and looked at the peacocks and he shared with me that it was often the male species of animals that is more beautiful.... the NERVE. Right? #redflag
Then he took me to dinner at Earls. Earls is my favorite. I could probably eat there 3 times a week and always love it. We both got chicken fingers because we were just children at the time.... lol. We also got chili chicken... and drank water. And I was whiny because the water glass was so small so I asked for a bigger one. ( and so began Eric putting up with my silly particular restaurant requests.) Does anyone care about these details? I still remember them! Then we went to the breakwater BEFORE it had the guard rails up. It was my first time there and it was so beautiful!
Eventually we went back to his house. We watched the movie "Easy A" with Emma Stone. Anddddddd..... he HELD my HAND under the blanket. And I was just like..... looking from side to side like... ermagerd. And at this moment my friend Jess texted me like 15 texts being like OMG HE TOTALLY LIKES YOU!! I KNEW IT!! ATTA BOY ERIC! YASSSSS! And he SAWWWWW them. After a while he pulled our hands out of the blanket and was like... "so what do you think of this?" (looking at our cuddly hands) and I was like... ":) I like it."
Exciting right?! Haha #barf
Lol.. k then. He drove me home. I was all smiles. And when he pulled up to Mahkeela's house he turned off the engine and sat to talk with me for a bit. Told me how much fun he had with me. And then he went on to say:
"Sooooo I've done my research and I figure... you like me... (judging by Jessica's texts) and I like you.... so I was wondering.... if you wanted to date?"
and then
out of no where
a DEER
jumps out of the woods right in front of our car
and I'm like :O
" LOOK ERIC!!! A DEER!!!"
and he's like,
"Katie, I asked you a question."
and I'm like
"BUT ERIC, THERE'S A DEER!!!!!!"
then the deer hopped off and I was left with the question he had asked me 1 minute before all the excitement.
I responded with something ridiculous like this:
"I don't really like labels... but if someone were to ask what was going on between us it would be cool to say that you were my boyfriend..."
Lol Kaaaaaaaaatie.... Talk about confusing.
Then he walked me to the door and I went inside to chat with Mahkeela who was half asleep at this point. And I slept on the floor beside her bed. Bug eyed once again. I had no idea what I was doing! So I texted Eric and he told me that it we could take things as slow as we wanted. And my heart was filled with peace.
That was July 29th, 2013. Only 8 days after he asked for my phone number at camp.
I went back to Vancouver and I was so happy. I can't even tell you. I was annoyingly excited. I still didn't really feel like I knew him very well but I was trusting the process. Seeing where it would go. I had no reason not to other than the fact that I was scared to get hurt again.
So then. I got this random Facebook message from one of my campers like a week later saying "ARE YOU DATING ERIC???????" and I replied. "Yes. lol" and she was like " AHHH THATS SO CUTE. WE CALLED IT!" And I told Eric about it. And he responds..
Oh! So we are dating?
:|
I was like............
Yes? I mean. I thought we already were?
Embarassing right? And he wasn't sure because I threw him off with my immediate response and texting him later that night saying that I needed to take it slow. Wow. So we clarified it. That day.
That was August 2nd, 2013. When we became officially official. :)