us

so one day i got the ccc newsletter in the mail. it had a picture of our soon-to-arrive youth pastor/worship leader, jay lesley. i thought he had a great smile & looked like fun. (i was right.)

his first sunday speaking my mom & claire kept giving me the eye. but then he introduced the girl he was dating...so that ended that. he told his story & seemed genuine. my mom left church that day saying to my dad, "that's the kind of man i could trust my daughters heart with." (right again!)

jay lived here for a while before we became friends. we said hello in passing but nothing much. he says that he knew i was funny (from overhearing conversations, etc.) and thought we'd be good friends.

the first time we ever spent time together he was basically "working me" so i'd help with a youth lock-in. we went to dinner, got ice cream at mcdonalds and went to the cheap movies. side story - the movie stopped for a few minutes & some guy yelled, "i want my dollar back!" that still makes me laugh.

months later we went to lunch one saturday but that was pretty much it.

jay lived in pine mtn at the time so he'd often take naps on my couch on sunday afternoons. that hardly counts as us spending time together. but i was already crushing on him a little so it meant the world to me!

we slowly started to share life. we'd sit & talk for hours. we went to movies, went 4-wheeler riding, went on adventures in his jeep, i chaperoned his youth trips, we went out to eat, and gave each other advice on ministry & dating.

all this time i was falling (madly) in love with him. he had no clue & no interest.

i enjoyed every minute of our time together. (still do.) i always thought he was so cool & mysterious. i've since gotten over that hahaha.

i won't lie after a while just being friends was REALLY hard for me. i had some great relationships during this time. so i wasnt all about jay. i may have wanted to be with him but i did attempt to date and let him go.

jay dated as well. i had the joy of watching him date some BEAUTIFUL girls. it was disgusting haha! i almost puked one time watching him reach over to hold hands with one girl.

i was completely intimidated by the girls he dated. they were perfectly fit & gorgeous. i knew i wasnt that. 

he and his guy friends would sometimes make comments about women that confirmed to me that he had high standards when it came to beauty...

i knew he loved me, our friendship, my humor, etc. but i was pretty well convinced i didnt measure up to his standards when it came to looks.

the devil took that & ran with it. he had me convinced (i'm still working my way out of it) that i didnt deserve a guy or even to be happy.

i'd already been on a diet hoping to lose a few but hearing his (this godly mans) desires when it came to women kinda pushed me into a vicious cycle of diet & exercise. he knows this....so i'm not sharing things he doesnt already know!

i just knew if christian men wanted "hot"women i was screwed.

when jay moved to columbus he'd recently come through a divorce. he was married for four years (or six?) she wasn't faithful to him and ended up leaving him. 

so he was in somewhat of a rebellious stage with women. thats where all this punk behavior came from. 

i knew he'd been married & i didnt bother me. i knew he'd made some poor choices with the ladies and i was ok with it.

HE on the other hand, struggled with those things. he saw me as this pure girl who'd always tried to do everything right and didnt think he "deserved" a girl like that.

so he thought he didnt deserve a girl like me and i thought he didnt like me simply b/c of my appearance. 

even still our friendship grew. for 3 years we were absolutely the BEST of friends. we spent tons of time together and even went to nashville & new york together. SO MUCH FUN. 

after a while though, i'd had enough. i couldnt do it anymore. being his friend was getting to complicated. he really did love me - so he'd say things/do things, etc that made me think he was interested in being more than friends. but then it never happened so i was getting confused/hurt and (honestly) more convinced i wasnt pretty or thin enough for any man. 

so i kicked him out of my life. after crying/talking/& praying with keith & pam i told jay to leave me alone. no talking, texting, or anything. i didnt even want him to talk to me at church. just give me some space to get over him.

that lasted a couple hours. he texted me like the next morning and told me he didnt want to go through life without me. too bad son.

he came over a week later & gave me some crap about being soooo great but missing some "x-factor." ohhhhh yesssss....he said that!!!!!!!!!!!!

i wanted to punch him. instead i cried & became more convinced i was fat & ugly. (that must have been the x-factor.)

LONG story short - his friend convinced him that he was just scared b/c i was a "good girl." 

he called me dec 14, 2005 and asked me to go with him to the ccc christmas party the next night. i said yes...why?! haha b/c i was in love.

God did the most precious thing that night. we sat with keith & pam and billy & melanie gross at supper. no joke - we spent the entire meal laughing/talking/sharing about how one person in each couple basically always did the right thing & the other lived a wild life. 

how's that for God showing jay it CAN work!! he did "deserve" a good girl :)  YAYYYY!!!

we got in the truck after the party & he basically told me that when i kicked him out of my life something "broke" in him. he realized he didnt want to life one day without me in his life. (i almost flipped.) then middle school style he asked me to be his girlfriend. 

we dated for 3 months. got engaged. and 3 months later got married. (aww our engagement story is really cute...)

i left out millions of details. but there's no way anyone cares that much!

we spent our first anniversary back at the place we stayed on our first night. soooo much fun. we took all the letters we'd written each other through the years (there were TONS) and read those, laughed, cried and fell in love all over again.  we also ate like FOOLS. funny story from that trip too...jay & i do not belong in "ritzy" places...

thursday we'll celebrate 5 years of bliss (hahahaha.) yay love!