First News from Gillette

Things are going well, still no job, but I'm working on it.

My first Sunday here was the fast Sunday, I bore my testimony in RS (because I'm a wuss and boys are scary), and then there was a potluck! John and I had made a double batch of my burrito casserole for it--of course it was a hit! Yes, that there was a note of pride. lol. I'm so silly!

Last week (which was the next week) was sad, as John was in Mitchell and I was all alone and didn't know anyone other than my roommate, so I went to the library and spent QT with Victor, who isn't nearly as much fun when he isn't connected to the Internet. . . Sunday was good, I conducted the music in Sacrament meeting--the pianist wasn't used to having a "real" conductor, so it took her a bit to realize I was actually conducting. . . lol! And I had everyone stand up for the rest hymn, which took them all by surprise! They should've warned me that they don't stand for those here when they asked me to conduct, I say. :) Two people in the congregation saw me and stood up, then the branch presidency twisted around and asked if we were standing, and I told them, yeah, I had motioned for everyone to stand three times already, we were standing, then they stood up and everyone else followed suit. lol. The pianist (Mary Beth--MB) was totally on my side. :)

It was a good meeting, good Sunday School, good RS lesson. After church I talked to MB and Chelsea, who is getting married today, and they invited me to get a pedicure with them the next day (Monday). So I went, and that was fun, my toes are still cute!! And I went to FHE (last week I skipped, I was tired after all the things I had done with John!)--water balloon dodgeball, which quickly turned into a water fight--it was so much fun! Then FHE Sarah (because there's more than one), Jordan, James & I went to Perkins and hung out for an hour or so. And that's probably when my cough settled into my chest--I now have an all-out cold, which is very annoying, especially since I realized I probably could've done something to alleviate it by changing out of my wet clothes after FHE. . . And John returned late last night, I now have a library card!! which will make everything much easier. :) And that's that. I am happy and optimistic again. John and I are reading scriptures together every night, and, in general, busy getting things done for his trailers, etc., during the day--I say it's all good!! I love you all and am sending you fierce thought hugs!!

Love and Laughs Always,

Angelmoth

I Must Be Dreaming. . .

Rapid City is off--Gillette is on.

I talked to Lisa today. It was good to hear from her, she reminded me that I'm excited to finally be leaving Madison, not just because of this thing with John--although that's happy, too.

However, I'm almost worried it's a dream, how can it be real? I'm talking into a box, and I hear him. . . And his voice is saying things I've wanted to hear for so long, how could I not wonder? I never thought this would happen, I thought our chance had passed years and years ago. But, here we are, and, at times, it's too fantastic to believe. I think I'll feel better about this when he comes for my birthday; it'll be so good to see him and talk to him face-to-face, even if all we do is repeat everything we've already said, I'll get to see him, gauge his body language and facial expressions. . . And finally see the sincerity I need.

It's so silly that I'm practically scared of this--at least, some of it. In the last eight-ten years, I've felt like all of my guy friends have left me--moved away, got married (which is practically moving away as they aren't in my ward anymore so I barely ever see them), died--and I'm scared he will, too. Not like he'd abandon me on purpose, but what if he dies? I don't know if I could handle that, not now. Eventually, yes. Oh, what a cruel twist of fate that would be, after so much wishful thinking and suddenly having those wishes come to life, only to shudder and die before the light of day. Yes, a tad dramatic, but I don't think that makes my concern invalid. Especially in light of the Fanbike incident, his falling off a three story building, car accidents. . . As far as I know, it's been a couple years since anything life-threatening has happened to him, but that doesn't help.

I have no idea how to express this to him--I don't know if I can, not even sure he has the capacity to understand this fully. One thing's for sure--it's definitely not a phone conversation. And it's probably premature to boot. So, all I can do for now is to tell him to take care. And worry, yes, always that. *sigh!* And, yes, I'll try to remember to talk to my therapist about this next time I see her.

In other news: I have found a new set of muscles that are sore, funnily enough, lower front right abdomen--yes, that's correct, just the one side. I'm not sure how it happened, either--yoga today didn't do anything for it--maybe laughing so much at xkpc comics? That's all I can come up with for that. And I've discovered that my right thigh stretches more easily than my left one. Why can't I ever be symmetrical in any part of my body? And my capris feel bigger.

Oh, and Meghan and I have started looking into apartment fixes. I think this will end up working! And there's the excitement again! And I'll leave you on that note. :)

South Dakota Vacation

Wow, talk about later. I just read my last blog and cried--I forgot how hard and awful everything was then. I feel much better currently. So, a few things before I get to my story: I'm planning on moving to South Dakota soonish--my guess is by the end of July. I came to this decision after a conversation with Donna at the temple--I asked her about her granddaughter, mentioned how much I missed having kids around, and she advised me to consider going back to the 2nd ward--"Just think about it; talk to your bishop about it," she said.

So I thought and prayed about it that day at the temple, and I've got to admit that the more I considered it, the more excited I became. I realized I was excited about leaving the singles ward, not specifically about going to the 2nd ward at all, and then Rapid City came to mind. I've thought and prayed about this, and made the decision sometime while preparing for my vacation with Mama to South Dakota. So, I'm going, and that part's done--now on to the fun. :)

OK, are you ready? Are you ready? I don't think you're ready, you don't LOOK ready. Oh, well, I'm ready, so here's the story, with as much truncation as I can bear:

Once upon a time there was a young woman named Angelmoth who would find the people on the outskirts of activities and then include them (I'm pretty sure she no longer does this anymore, but she used to). In this manner she met a nice fellow named John. Blah blah blah, she liked him, she took him to her junior prom (her first date, probably his, too), where she realized that she really liked him, nothing really happened, she went to college way far away, but they were still friends. After her 2nd year of college, she came home for the summer to find that, lo and behold! He was dating someone else. Granted, this someone else (Lindsay) is rather forward in her pursuit of John. . . Something one could accuse Angelmoth of herself. Anyway, she was upset, who did Lindsay think she was, horning in on her territory like that? With what definitely were dubious motivations, Angelmoth decided to tell John she liked him. They held hands the night of the revelation and a good part of the next day, as well. Then, nothing. She waited, nothing. Finally, right before John went on his mission (July? 2000), she got him to talk to her about it, on their way to his house from Institute. She doesn't remember most of the conversation because she was rather stuck on the first part and being unable to escape--he didn't like her, he had just held her hand because he 'thought [she] wanted it'. I'm sure you can guess at least a bit of what she felt. He went on his mission, she got married the next year, he came home, her husband died, blah blah blah.

Once while John was home visiting (2006?), they went on a walk, and he told her that when he said he hadn't liked her, it was a lie, that he had liked her. She was shocked, having long ago given up on John as a romantic interest, considering what he had said before. Then she started thinking about it off and on. Throughout the blah-ness to follow there were several times where she wondered if maybe he did still like her and if she liked him and what that meant and why, but did nothing. Recently, however, the wonder increased and she started considering actually talking to him about it, but, again, did nothing because she didn't know what her motivations this time were--she worried she might be trying to validate herself or something, and did not think that a good enough reason to do anything.

At one point, her mother requested that she accompany her to her ancestral home for a vacation, and Angelmoth accepted, as she had no job and no real reason to not go. She talked to John--he lived only a couple hours away from where they would be--he was to be passing through anyway, would be happy to stop and visit, too. 1st day: dinosaur park with Mom, left her at the house while they went driving around to find a museum that they weren't going to go to (as Mom was the original person who wanted to go to said museum), which was frustrating, driving on a road Mom insisted John needed to see, which was beautiful but also frustrating, and many other things, including aches & pains, and, therefore, crankiness. End result: small explosion at the end of the day. Angelmoth got over herself, but not quickly enough. John was perturbed, and spent the next morning fixing the crooked ceiling fan and not talking to Angelmoth so he'd be "less annoying". She didn't take this well, had tried to apologize and explain to no avail. Eventually, as she watched him work on this supposedly meaningless (since, as far as she could see he'd never really have to deal with it ever again) task with sorrow growing in her heart, she realized she loved him. She immediately thought, "Oh, crap. Now what?"

Blah blah blah, they made up somehow (explanation of how it was a culmination of little things throughout the day and apology of not being vocal enough about her frustration, no doubt he apologized for something, too), everyone enjoyed having him there, even Uncle Jim, even as John and Angelmoth trounced him repeatedly at Mexican Train, whatever, John left a couple days later. He was going to Mitchell, which was on Angelmoth and Mom's way back home, and actually near their stopping point, only a half hour away from Mom's brother's house. As Angelmoth had wussed out so far on this trip by not talking to John about this, she felt no compunction in borrowing the car to give herself another go at whatever this was.

On the way to meet John, she contemplated her situation and felt great peace and excitement, an odd combination, to be sure.

Blah blah blah, Corn Palace, pictures, then a park and a lot of talking. First (always) politics, then a friend of his who was in an abusive situation, wherein Angelmoth tried to explain the helplessness an abused person feels, including experiences from her life and a few of her friends (John said something about being sorry she ever had to go through anything like that, she tried to blow it off by saying she knew so many people who had it so much worse, but he'd have none of that, of course), then she told him a story--that morning at breakfast Mom had given the prayer, in which she prayed for Dad (dead) and Angelmoth's husband Jeremy (also dead, remember?) in the same breath. This made Angemoth uncomfortable, and she talked to Mom about it, telling her it didn't make her angry, just uncomfortable, that she could pray for Jeremy whenever she felt like it as long as Angelmoth wasn't around. Mom huffed a bit and said "[Angelmoth], just remember that, before you can make it to the Celestial Kingdom, you need to forgive him." This was totally uncalled for; Angelmoth reminded her that she wasn't angry, just uncomfortable, and that she was pretty sure she had forgiven him. Obviously this exchange upset Angelmoth a bit, as she doesn't want to stay sealed to Jeremy, etc. John then asked if she could get the sealing broken, and she explained that she could, but it wasn't advisable to do so unless you were to be immediately sealed to someone else.

Blah blah blah, at some point John said that he had been very surprised when hearing of Angelmoth's marriage as he had thought that, after he got back from his mission, "there would be a courtship of some kind and then [they'd] get married."

!!! How surprising!! Of course, Angelmoth could not hold back, said, "If I'd known that, my entire life would be different!" She also said something about how perhaps the beginning of her and Jeremy's relationship may have been a rebound from John (not something I would advise her to say at this point, but it's over and done now--it may give the wrong impression as she did actually love the guy enough to marry him at one point, you know), blah blah blah. . .

At some point John stood up and said, "Oh, it's getting late, you'd probably better go."

She knew it was now or never. She raised one finger, and locked her gaze on the picnic table. "Actually, I've been thinking about something about this for a long time." She paused, wondering how to begin. "You've been one of my best friends for at least a third of my life."

John sat down again. "I think you've been my best friend for as long as I've known you."

Angelmoth snuck a look at him, emboldened by this revelation, but not enough to actually meet his eyes. "I was wondering if maybe. . . we could give us a try." She continued to stare at the table as she careened towards self-destruction. "It's OK if you don't want to, I'm fine with that, I know it's sudden and unexpected and I don't want you to feel like you have to or anything," she blathered, as one does when one is nervous and laying things of this nature all out in the open.

"Um, sure, that'd be fine. But how would it work? I mean, I live a thousand miles away!"

"Well, when I move to South Dakota, that'll make it much easier." She remembered last week when she had told him about her plans to move and his delight at the idea of coming up to see her every weekend. At the time, she had wondered what game he was playing, was he going to try to keep her from dating? But now. . .

"Yeah, it will."
----
And that's all I remember well. There was a joke at some point "Well, at least we don't need to get to know one another!" Umm, we hugged, no hand holding, no kissing (something Meghan was sad about, as I am now her primary source of vicarious romance). This was on Sunday. I talked to him on Monday after I got home, and then again last night. Both were good conversations, though I was a little absorbed in Victor (my PC) after my long absence, and so was not very vested in Monday's call. Last night he ended the call with a rushed "Love ya, bye." I responded with "I love you, too, good-bye." because, of course, I already knew, I just didn't want to scare him off or whatever. . .

So I'm in a long-distance relationship with John!! He's coming for my family birthday weekend next month, acted like it wasn't anything at all to come. Isn't it exciting?