Our kids laugh at us because we text each other so often. We have since we started dating. Before little Laura realized Craig and I were "girlfriend and boyfriend", when she still thought I was her personal playmate and just another one of the women in their life who was helping out, she teased him about texting me. "Who are you texting Daddy, Juuuuulieeee?"
His teenage daughter Alyssa rolls her eyes and says "Teenagers are supposed to text, Dad, not old people!" Those young whipper snappers always think every new fangled contraption was invented for them.
My daughters, Sara and Stephanie, used to complain that I got more texts than they did -- and I had a silly smile on my face when I texted him. "Are you sexting Mom?" they would ask, in mock disgust. Ok, maybe it was real disgust.
Even now we text each other several times during the workday and sometimes when we're sitting in the same room together. I guess it's our way of "whispering sweet nothings" in the only way we can with an 8 year old, teenager, and at least one young adult in the house with us at any given time.
From the beginning Craig saved my texts to reread when we were too busy with our separate lives to spend time together, as he sat on the porch gazing at the stars. He came by his romantic tendencies honestly -- his father recently showed me the letters his young girlfriend, Craig's mother, wrote to him when he was away in the Navy, almost 60 years ago.
Craig is always telling me I should write the story of how we fell in love, or what I call our "whirlwind romance", and that story would have to include texting because that's how busy people have to communicate...even us old people.
I call our romance a whirlwind romance not only because we dated for such a short time before getting married, but also because it involved a real whirlwind. Craig humors me and says the whirlwind must have been a sign of some sort; I believe that it was, of course. Here is an "excerpt" from our romantic story -- maybe part of a book I want to write someday.
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He texted me to ask what I was doing. "Making banana bread", I texted back as I smiled because he was thinking of me.
"I love banana bread!" he responded.
"I'll save some for you", I quickly typed with my thumbs as I tried to remember how different dating was before cell phones and texting. Things had changed in the 30 years since I had last dated.
"How about bringing me some? I'm out at the park cleaning up the softball diamond, getting things ready for the season. I'm hungry and I could use a break," he texted back a few minutes later, with full punctuation and caps, as I was learning was his habit.
I smiled again because he wanted to see me. We had been dating for only a few weeks and he always seemed eager to hear from me or to make plans to see me, whether for just a few minutes or several hours. Often in the evenings he texted to say he was doing the dreaded laundry or dishes, he was waiting to to pick up his oldest daughter at softball practice, or he had just tucked his little girl into bed. He texted me to ask how my day was going or if I was enjoying the sunshine at lunch. We shared details of our work days, our evening meals, and our errands, in between our few planned dates. It was so nice to hear that "beep" during the day, or just as I lay down at night, which let me know someone special had me on his mind.
I pulled into the park and saw his SUV under a tree on the other side of the parking lot, but since I couldn't tell if there were other open spaces near it, I parked in the first available parking space. Near the path leading to the diamond I saw him watching for me and he smiled and waved as he recognized me. I got out of my car with my foil packet of banana bread -- just one piece so he would have to come over to my house if he wanted more. I was a little bit self conscious as I walked toward him but when I saw the pleasure on his face I felt more relaxed. The park around me blurred and sounds of the kids playing muffled; all there was for me at that moment was that smiling man walking toward me with sunshine on his face and cool breeze blowing his hair.
I think he touched my arm and kissed my cheek as we met, but I don't remember for sure. We walked close together, our arms touching, toward his SUV that was parked in a small island of grass in the circle drive. He opened the driver's side door and put the banana bread inside, and then hesitated before motioning into the vehicle with a nod of his head and a lift of his eyebrow.
I replied, "This is fine, it's nice out here", as I leaned against the fender. He shut the car door then moved close to me, touching my hand and wrapping one finger around my little finger as he leaned next to me. He turned his head, grinned and stared at me but didn't say anything, so I said "What?", but he simply replied with a "What?" of his own, then turned his body toward me, still leaning on the car.
Not knowing what to say, I mentioned the weather, of course. "It sure feels like spring. The sun is warm but the air is still cool." He agreed, as we looked around us at the island of grass that was beginning to waken and turn green after the long winter.
"I'm so glad the winter is over", he said, still staring at me.
We stood talking, and now holding hands not just fingers, as people both of us knew, or one of us knew, walked around their cars to load up their cleaning supplies, lawn-care equipment, and softball bats. When they saw us standing there together, holding hands, their faces registered a look of surprise, then confusion, then a huge eye-twinkling smile. Very few people in town knew we were dating, and many had no idea I had been divorced for 6 months (alone much longer), but most had been "looking out" for him and his family since his wife passed away a year and a half earlier. I'm sure some who saw us, especially those who don't know what it is like to be alone for so long, or who don't understand loss like we do, thought it was a little soon for either of us to be dating.
"People can see us, you know," I said as he leaned closer to me.
"I don't care", he replied, still looking into my eyes, with a quick glance to my mouth. "I'm proud to show off my beautiful girlfriend. And to be fair I did try to get you into my car, you know, hoping I might get a kiss."
"Oh, so I'm officially your girlfriend? I feel a little old to be called girlfriend."
He smiled and said softly, "If you want to be my girlfriend."
"Hmmm, I'll have to think about that...oh, look at that!" I changed the subject as I pointed around him to the left of us, to a pile of dried, decaying leaves that had lifted a few inches off the ground to slowly blow round and round in a circle. "It's a little whirlwind".
He looked at where I was pointing and the two of us quietly watched as more leaves, twigs, dust and dirt joined the small whirlwind as it picked up speed and circled in front of us, following the curve of the gravel drive. We watched in awe as it completed the semi-circle, twirling round and round, and lifted off the ground to the right of us, then blew off with a gust into the sky.
We looked at each other with our eyes wide and laughed. "Whoa", I said, "That was strange! Have you ever seen one like that? Usually they just blow for a few seconds then die off, but that one just kept going around us, like our own personal whirlwind. Think it meant something?"
"I think it means we're supposed to be together," he said as he pulled me close.
"Yes, I would like to be your girlfriend," I answered.
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