CURRENT LOVE by Rena Jones

I suppose I could title this The Only Love of My Life rather than simply Current Love. I met Rick in high school. I was a sophomore and just barely sixteen. He was a senior and on the water polo team. My best friend introduced us while I was ditching tennis class. Rick drilled her, wondering why he’d never seen me around. I hated school and was hardly ever there. Two days later, he asked me to a dance. He would have asked sooner, but I stayed home from school those two days. Go figure.

Rick and I just clicked. It was like we were married from day one. In the seven years we dated, we never broke up. There was never any question if we were right for each other. Somehow, we just knew. In fact, we bought our wedding rings several years before we even got engaged. I’d like to say we were 100% sure, but the reality was the jeweler was having a really great sale. The reason we dated so long was because Rick had plans of becoming a doctor. After high school, he started college, but eventually he had to stop because of money. He ended up working in law enforcement instead. I used to joke I got ripped off – I was supposed to marry a doctor, but I got a cop instead. Talk about your false advertising!

We were married on Valentine’s Day in 1988. Now most people think having a Valentine’s Day anniversary would be the most romantic thing ever. It can be, but it sucks going out to dinner because it’s such a busy night for restaurants. Typically, if we celebrate with dinner, we usually go the night before. If anything, having a Valentine’s Day anniversary makes it easy to remember.

Even though we’ll celebrate our 24^th anniversary this year, we’ve been together a total of 31 years. That’s a long time. Seriously. I mean, we’ve had friends who didn’t even live that long. Most people we know from school are divorced, some several times over. I suppose you could say high school sweethearts are almost a rarity now. We’ve had our ups and downs. Mostly ups. We’ve been blessed with four beautiful children. We’re also turning into one of those crotchety, old couples who can read each other’s minds. We’ve always done that, but lately it’s getting worse. It’s kind of freaking me out a little. For example, he’ll ask what I want to eat, and before I have time to say what popped into my mind, he says it. Freaky.

Rick has always been my rock. I came from a single parent home, living in less than desirable living conditions. Rick has always made me feel not only safe, but stabile. He’s the worrier and I’m the laid-back one who says, “Everything will work itself out.” I think we balance each other out well. The only thing we ever fight over is food! I eat low-carb and Rick did for a while, but he got burned out. He’d lost a bunch of weight, but put most of it back on. So whenever I talk about carbs, he gets all cranky on me. If the worse we do is argue about how many net carbs there are in a bag of peanuts, then we’re not that bad off. Tonight he brought me home a box of sugar-free conversation hearts, so I guess I’ll have to keep him. For now.

BIO –

Rena Jones is a homeschooling mom and children’s author. Besides writing and harping on her boys to quit coming up with new story ideas and do their spelling, she enjoys photography, wildlife watching, national parks, camping, exercising, and music. She lives in Bigfork, Montana with her husband, four kids, and two cats.

 Blog – http://renajjones.blogspot.com/

Website – http://home.centurytel.net/RickRena/index.html

(Happy Anniversary Rena & Rick!)