Trust That You will Know Your Future when You Meet it

Twenty seven years ago, today, at the young age of eighteen, I met the man whom I would marry just four years later. We were both freshman at Syracuse University, and had acknowledged each other in passing many times before, but on this day, twenty seven years ago, I mustered up the courage to have a friend who knew him, SHOW me where his dorm room was. I emphasize the word "show", because she was only supposed to walk me past it. Nonchalantly, like we were just walking by. You know, kind of on the way to someplace else! Little Miss Cupid ended up knocking on his door, and before I could run for the elevator, there he was. He looked at me with a warm, boyish smile that I have since come to know quite well, and he invited us into his room. He was very handsome, in a youthful, athletic way. He had a friendly, outgoing personality which drew me to him, even more. I sat, shyly, on the edge of his bed, as he and my friend talked for a while. The entire time they were talking, he kept sneaking glances at me. I was smitten. Later that night, we went to a party together, and spent hours just talking. We spent the next few weeks getting to know each other, and the more that I knew about him, the more that I felt like I had known him for my entire life, and then some. I am not sure whether, when I gazed into his eyes, I saw my past or my future. I only knew that I never wanted to be away from him, again. We spent the next four years growing up together, and when we graduated from college, we married, packed the remnants of our college life into a Dodge Cube Van that had over 100,000 miles on it, and drove from New Jersey to California. Because we had another car, we were not able to drive together, and so we caravaned across the country carrying everything we owned, ourselves, and our four cats and our dog. We must have looked like The Beverly Hillbillies, but without the new found windfall of wealth. Looking back, I must admit that it was either a very brave, or very stupid thing to do, because we had no family in California, we had no friends there, and we knew nothing about where we wanted to settle. We just picked up, like the old-time settlers and headed West. It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, as Mr. Charles Dickens once wrote. Our married life together, started out as an amazing adventure.

So here I sit, twenty seven years later, thanking God that I had the good sense(or youthful lack of it!) to follow my heart into the arms of the man who, to this day, can make me think that everything will always turn out just as it should. He is my constant, my safe place to hide, my forever love. Sometimes, even at the early age of eighteen years old, we know the exact moment, when our future appears before our eyes. And sometimes, if we are courageous enough to follow-up on that moment, our lives end up following a winding, adventurous path, that leads us to exactly where we are meant to be, twenty seven years later. With immense gratitude, on this eve before Thanksgiving, I am filled with nostalgia for our great beginning, an overflowing heart for our today, and an open place inside of my spirit for all that we have to anticipate. I know, that as long as I can find refuge in the arms of my man, that life will always turn out the way that it is supposed to.

May you remember the importance of your past, find comfort and lots of love in your present, and trust that the future will be everything that it is meant to be.