Part Twenty Four: Of Trip Number Three and More Growing Up

"A thousand miles seems pretty far,
But they've got planes and trains and cars,
I'd walk to you if I had no other way..."
-Plain White T's

So what happened on trip #3? God went crazy. God did what I didn't expect, for both 'good' and 'bad'. Looking back, however, it was all perfect. I say that with complete honesty. Complete. Honesty.

Flashback to the Wednesday before Jacob is to come visit NH with Aubrey. I'm teaching until 7:30pm at the dojo. I'm finishing the last class of the evening and I'm sweaty, nasty, and ready to drop. Jacob had promised me the Sunday before that he would help me through this week, but I had no idea just how much he would be able to do that. I had no idea.

Sitting in the office trying to finalize bootcamp curriculum, I haul out my phone to text my one and only Mr. Clifton. I feel pretty dull all around. 

Jacob is asking me if I want to have a date night. I say yes, but I know I'm kinda sorta not really in the mood. I'm tired and I miss him. A lot. And as I walk out of the dojo, I feel a sense of mediocrity sink under my skin. I'm gross, tired, and missing Jacob. I want to book it to my car and just get home. 

Before I can make it to my car, however, some friends who are out on a bike ride spot me and stop to talk. It's not that I don't enjoy talking. I do. But at this moment, I want nothing to do with anyone. I just want to slink to my car and go home. 

I make small talk and say something about a girl crossing the street who's wearing a shirt that covers only a small margin of her epidermis (epidermis is more fun to say than skin, as a heads up). I talk about missing Jacob and how I need to go home, and with that I said farewell and turned to continue walking to my car. I pulled my phone out to text Jacob in my typical end-of-the-work-day fashion. I went to open the back door to my car, head still down, fingers still texting.

And that's when I looked up. And that's when I jumped back, pressed my hand to my mouth, jumped a little more, and felt the urge to cry, laugh, grin, yell, and sniffle all at once.

The car door opened and I began to protest.

"No no, I can't leave all this stuff on the ground out here! No!"

And with that, we put my bags in my trunk and without a second thought, jumped in the back of my car and hugged each other tight.

I didn't know how Jacob Clifton got in the back of my car. But I didn't care. 

Oooh. I hadn't at all forgotten how much I loved this. 

It took a few minutes of shocked silence followed by laughs before I could manage to ask what happened in that he was here in NH.

The story? Well. Jacob took it upon himself to surprise me and show up a week earlier than planned. And, of course, my dear mother had willingly worked with him to spring this on me.

My wonderful, scheming family. I suppose I still love them.

And with a start like that, trip #3 was something not to be forgotten. Other highlights?

-On Thursday, Jacob got to see me teach for the second time. I was just as antsy the second time around as I was the first time, that's to say the least.

-Jacob got to come to Crossfit on Friday with me. Let's just say that nothing says bonding like doing box jump burpees together.

-We learned a lot more about each other. Though Jacob was staying down the road at a neighbors, we got to experience everyday life together. If I went somewhere, Jacob came with me. If I did something, Jacob did it with me.

-We danced. A lot.

-Jacob too care of me, I took care of him. There were some crazy days were we had to be at the dojo to teach in the morning, come home to eat, run back to teach, and not get home until 7pm. And yes. I was usually a sweaty mess by then. But despite that, Jacob would wait patiently, sometimes sitting out in the dojo lobby for hours while I taught classes. I got myself a gentleman, folks. I'd cook for him, he'd massage my poor dojo feet, I'd buy him a toothbrush (due to poor memory and poor packing him part, ahem), he'd constantly be jumping up to do things for me.

-Jacob and I both got in the water. Yes. Neither of us are huge fans of swimming. But we both made the plunge. Applause, please.

-Maybe (okay, probably) my favorite memory from trip #3 was Monday night. After a long afternoon and evening of teaching, I was ready to get done. Poor Jacob had once again been stuck in the lobby all afternoon. Walking back to my car after classes, however, he informed me that we were not going home, but instead he was getting me flowers (see top photo) and we were going out to dinner. It was the perfect, heart melting, sweet and wonderfully romantic way to end what had been a long, sticky, and sweaty day. Perhaps what made it even more romantic was that we were both sweaty to a (large) degree, I had smudged makeup, and we both were loopy from lack of sleep. All in all, Jacob deserves a medal for pulling off that evening.

-Backtracking for a moment, Sunday was a close runner up to Monday in terms of being my favorite. After church, our neighbors' backyard cookout, and feeding an overly starving Jacob, we went to Lower Falls for a perfect ending to the weekend. I remember doing pushups outside of the Ranger station, making back massage trains in the sun with Aubrey, Becki, and Tim, fighting the currents and freezing water, and getting 'windmill hair' after it was all said and done. On the drive home, Jacob and I fell asleep.

-After we got home that same Sunday night, Tim marched us all out to mini golf in Meredith. It was potentially the most interesting game ever played. There were mosquitos everywhere, Jacob was constantly poking me in the butt with his golf club, Aubrey kept hitting the ball off the course, and after it was all said and done, Jacob and I tied for second with a score of 51. Interesting.

-Aubrey and I had lots of 'peanut butter dates', which only furthered my believe in how peanut butter can bring about world peace.

-Jacob promised to (and did!) paint my nails. Aubrey insisted they were dreadful, but I loved them. It was a dismal and depressing day when they chipped away.

-The neighborhood cat, Tiger, was obsessed with Jacob. Tiger, with his goodnatured drooling habit and all, made himself right at home whenever Jacob was around. That vagabond cat followed us on a walk the night before Jacob and Aubrey left. The whole walk. Basically, Tiger is a kindred cat spirit.

-The last thing I saw of Jacob was him in the street with Tiger as I drove away to teach classes. I struggled not to cry, but I attribute my success in not crying to the fact that I literally had no tears left after the night before.

What next? We didn't know. We knew the last weekend in August would be our target weekend, but whether or not it would work was yet to be determined.

Was trip #3 worth it? In a heartbeat, I'd say yes. Was it hard? Yes. There were hard lessons learned. There were moments of real hurt and real heartache, but there were moments of indescribable joy, happiness, and love for someone that had until recently, been a world away. Just a year ago, Jacob Clifton was just another name, another face, another person I'd never met. But then God got in the middle, stirred things up, and well... things have never been the same since. And for every day since that first day, I've been grateful. So, so grateful.