ON THE BLOG- INTRODUCING THE BAIRS

What to write about this time? That’s basically the question I ask myself for hours before I even type one word. (Cause let me tell you this, professional bloggers that have something to write about every week are impressive. I think this blogging thing is super hard!) There are literally so many things I could write about this time though. As I jogged through titles to put out there some of them were

·       Engaged and afraid. (Kinda like Naked and afraid, but the LDS engagement version)

·       On Dealing with Uncertainty (Which I might still do later, because I have a lot to say)

·       The Ups and Downs of Sex (mostly because you ate up the other article about how I thought it ruined love for me, and I am going t partner with another blogger talking about pornography sometime soon)

·       New Years Resolutions- How to be real with yourself. (Let’s be honest, I’m awful at keeping resolutions, and I wanted you all to feel better about also being awful at it.)

There were so much more, and while those all are great topics and titles to write on, I didn’t feel like they were right for this point and time.

Today’s topic is “Heart and Soul.”

So, many of you know about the recent events happening in my life. We are gaining another member in the Nys to be a Saint family. That wonderful soul is my fiancé. (Maybe at some point I will rope him into writing a few blog posts for me and sharing his thoughts and feelings with you all- its doubtful though, this isn’t really his forte.) Let me tell you about this man and our story for a second.

The Origin story: ( Sorry this ones going to be a long one)

Like many members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Days Saints, I study at one of the church sponsored schools. That means that I hang out with a bunch of “Mormons” all day and attend classes that all “normal” colleges would have you attend. I still attend science, English, math, etc. I just do it in a setting compatible with the spirit of God. Anyways, I have studied through this university for about a year now and I love it. I love the culture on campus and the culture of Rexburg Idaho. One of the things that is very much part of the culture of the church and of Rexburg is Family home evening.  Now because not all of you are members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints I’ll take a minute to explain this. Something we have inside the church is a program called Family Home Evening (Often abbreviated as FHE) and in this program you meet with your family, gain a further testimony of gospel topics and bond with your family. Often this is a time for council and talking. My personal family at home did this at the dinner table most often. But, the “typical” FHE is on Monday nights and lasts about an hour. Back to FHE, Here at school we are split up by apartments into FHE groups where an apartment of boys gets and apartment of girls, they meet together once a week and play games, have a devotional, and hang out. Its completely free for the group to pick the activity and to decide what they want to discuss that week. Often times FHE “Families” will meet more than once throughout the week due to the close bonds they create. Sometimes they create REALLY close bonds.

About a year ago, I was here for the first time. I had taken college courses before and actually graduated high school with an associates degree in “general studies”, but BYU-I was a whole new ballgame. After the hustle and bustle of the first few weeks my fiancé at the time and I fell into our habits and classwork became routine. We would see each other fairly often, but I kept seeing someone else more. Matthew. Matthew was one of my FHE brothers that semester, and to say I spent some time with him would be an understatement. Looking back I feel bad for all the times I spent ranting to him about my then relationship. But, he didn’t mind. We would see each other when I waited for my ex to get our of class. We would talk in passing almost everyday. We would occasionally text when we needed some Karo or sweetened condensed milk. (Yes, I am a grandma at heart… I keep that on hand for the off chance someone needs it.) And we played a lot of volleyball. I think I would be lying, and Matthew knows this, if I said that at first I didn’t think Matthew was annoying. He was really sweet and really nice but, he never really could catch the clue that we wanted him to go away. Him and I often talked about his previous relationship and talked about his personal hardships. I felt for the guy, he was sweet, struggling, and he played sports. (I mean, what else could I need?!) After Winter semester last year though we both went separate ways. My relationship at the time had failed and I went home, he continued school and stayed in Rexburg. Not too long later his relationship hit the rocks and then failed. (Not for a lack of trying on his part, things just didn’t end up working out.) Not too long later I had texted him saying that I had heard a Killers song and thought about him, later that night he called on the way home from a movie and we talked and caught up for a while. A couple weeks later was my birthday and we started talking again. And from that point on we didn’t stop talking. Our talking progressed from occasional texting and calling to talking every day for hours. It later became facetiming each other, and then we were visiting each other.

Something super frustrating about our story is that Matthew and I told each other that we love the other before we decided to date. It was something kinda unexpected and not really intentional. Both of us had just gotten out of messy relationships and the last thing we wanted to do was to get into another one. We agreed that if BY NEXT JANUARY we were both still single we could talk about going on a few dates. (That lasted all of about 2 days…) A couple weeks later we were dating “hardcore” (As I would say) and then he came out to visit my family in Portland. All of you have seen those pictures so I wont bore you again with that part of the story. After that trip we knew we wanted to marry each other. We kept talking about the possibility and after a few months of visiting each other back and forth we finally got engaged.

This brings me to the topic I want to address.

GETTING ENGAGED IST EVERYTHING.

Engagement is definitely something. Its something special and it’s a great moment, but soon you have to outlive the fairytale feelings and realize that you need to go back to normal life. Movie, TV shows, country songs, etc have painted this picture of what an engagement should look like. Other people on social media have dictated what it should look like. We have this picture esc moment in our head with flash mobs at Disney, a giant waterfall behind you as he gets on one knee, a hot air balloon ride, and so much more when in reality it could be you two talking in the front room of your house, wearing matching sweaters and being with your family. (That’s how mine was.) While the 30 second act f Matthew asking me to marry him wasn’t the most magical moment, it was special. There is nothing about the moment I would change, EXCEPT I wish I would have cried because my mother video taped it all and I look very ingenuine, but it was exactly the way it was supposed to be.

The point though is that after we got engaged there wasn’t some magical fireworks and sparks flying everywhere, but everyday since then as we have gone about our life together there has been little moments of fireworks and sparks flying. It hasn’t been easy to adjust to being so close to each other all the time, but it hasn’t been unmanageable. We love each other, we just get to practice how to communicate with each other in person more. Not everyday is rainbows and unicorns, but everyday I get to learn something new about him that I absolutely adore. I am very excited to marry him and spend my days and nights with him, but I look forward most to having those pinnacle movie moments with him.