Love Story

Nothing gets my heart all pitter-pattering like a love story. Books, movies, music - I will consume anything that tells a tale of a boy and girl falling in love. And my favorites are love stories on blogs. These are real life romances! I especially enjoyed reading Bridget's and Natalie's "how we met" posts. So what if I've read them more than once? Anyway, because it's Valentine's Day and because our story has never been written anywhere at all, here's the Story of Spencer and Erica:

Our first date ended with Spencer vowing never to talk to me again and me crying my eyes out. 

And it was all.my.fault.

Spencer and I met in September 2007 at Brigham Young University in Provo, Utah. I was 19, he was 22, and I had just started my sophomore year of college. I had spent the summer before at home, working from April through August and spending a lot of time with my family. My parents had recently moved from Montgomery, Alabama to backwoods Massachusetts, and I knew nary a soul, if there were any (date-able) souls to know. I also spent the summer trying to forget my freshman-year boyfriend. We dated the majority of that year, and the relationship ended less than well. Thankfully, he was off serving a mission for our church, and I never had to talk to him ever again. Prior to that boyfriend, I had had another boyfriend most of my senior year of high school (that one ended well. We're still friends), so by this point, you can imagine I was sick of boyfriends. I was ready to just flirt around and date for fun. I would go on a million dates with a million different guys (as if)! My family laughed in my face at my plans and set up a bet as to when I'd acquire my next man-candy. Fools. 

In addition to my No Boyfriend Plan, I also had a Study Abroad Plan. I was going to spend the next semester in Spain! And I was focused - I'd been wanting to go to Spain for y.e.a.r.s. So I worked all summer, got a job that fall semester, got my application in early, and BAM! got accepted to the program! My plans were on target, and nothing would shake me from them. NOTHING!

In the fall of 2007, back in Utah, I lived in this huge apartment complex south of campus. A guy named Spencer Ricks lived in the same building. His apartment and my apartment were part of the same Family Home Evening or FHE group (basically a group, sanctioned by BYU, that gets together once a week in order to marry the students off as quickly as possible. It works.). Monday, September 17, 2007, our group met for the very first time. We had a marshmallow gun war. Spencer wore a "Se Habla Espanol" t-shirt, and I remember being impressed that he was from New York. East Coast Mormons are a rare find, and being from east of the Mississippi myself, I've always been partial to them. I also remember being more attracted to his roommate than to Spencer. Blondes weren't really my type. :)

Because my roommate had a crush on his roommate (or was it the other way around?), our apartments did a lot of stuff together. Parties, movies, school devotionals - it was actually at a devotional, maybe the very next day after we met, that Spencer and I had our first one-on-one conversation. My two takeaways were this: he was very smart (hot) and he laughed a lot (also hot). For some reason, my prior boyfriends were so serious. It drove me nuts! I love to laugh, and I love to be with people that laugh! And Spencer? That big, ol' mouth of his will open wide, and he'll chortle, chuckle, giggle, and guffaw. Not only did he laugh a ton himself, but also he made, and makes, me laugh. He is just a funny guy. And he did well in school, played sports, AND played the drums. My goodness! Thus began my crush on that tall, blonde-haired, blue-eyed, funny genius.

But that didn't disrupt My Plan. I crushed on Spencer while flirting and semi-crushing on other guys as well. I convinced myself that my crush on Spencer was "nbd," although the hours and hours of one-on-one talking seemed to point otherwise. Eventually (hah! like 2 or 3 weeks after we met), Spencer asked me on a date. I said no. He asked me on a date again. I said no again. He asked me on a date A THIRD TIME. I said yes. I had to work the first two times. Please, I'm not heartless...much.

Ok, finally, we are going on our first (official) date. But in case you haven't had enough back story, here's a bit more: the last few days leading up to The Date, Spencer noticed I was flirting with other boys. That pissed him off. And I noticed that he seemed to really like me. More than was allowed by The Plan. And I might have liked him more than was allowed? And that scared me off. Irritated and upset, we both went into that date thinking "this is the last time I hang out with this person!" Fools.

For our first date, Spencer and I went to Starbucks for hot chocolate and then rode his forest-green, soft-top Jeep Wrangler up the canyon to go stargazing. I miss that car! *sniff* As we rode up the windy mountain road, sipping our cocoas, the conversation was a bit awkward and stilted because we were both frustrated with the other person. Little did we know that we'd end up our entire lives frustrated with each other. Foreshadow, much? :)

Finally, we got to our star-gazing grounds, and the ice thawed as we looked at the heavens through Spencer's grandpa's star-gazing binoculars that he "borrowed." The awkwardness eased up, and we sat kinda close together while sharing the binoculars. And then it happened. On that cool September night, high up in the Wasatch Mountains, we kissed. We kissed as millions of twinkling stars looked down at us. We kissed, and all was right.

At least, it was right until I remembered The Plan. Spencer and I were holding hands in his car, coming back down the mountain, and I had a monstrous pit in my stomach. What had I done?!?! All signs were pointing to us actually "dating," and I couldn't date anyone until I got back from Spain! So I did the only thing I knew to do. I took my hand out of Spencer's and said those fateful words - "I don't think I can do this."

Ohhhhh! I will never forget the look on Spencer's face for the rest of my life; it went from elated to confused and hurt in a heartbeat! I don't really want to relive the conversation that ensued, but basically, it was Spencer telling me to be flexible in my plans and me telling him that I was inflexible. Eventually, he saw that I was immovable, and so he gave up. "Ok. That's it, I guess," he said. With that, we went back to our respective apartments, and as I stated earlier, he vowed never to see me again and I bawled my eyes out. Happy first date to us.

As for what happened after that, a few very awkward days happened wherein we ran into each other and barely spoke to each other. I also realized in those few days that Spencer had become my best friend in those few short weeks and that I missed him terribly when we weren't talking. Missing him, I called him up, we talked it over, and decided to give dating each other a shot. I only had to go through one more round of doubts - which occurred when Spencer was dealing with his grandmother's death and I did NOT tell him about those doubts - before I finally let go of The Plan.

And once I let go, I was a goner. We dated all semester, fell in love, did the long distance thing while I was in Spain, and then on August 7th, 2008, Spencer got down on one knee and asked the most important question of our lives. We were married on December 27, 2008, 15 months and 10 days from the day we met. We now laugh about how if we hadn't kissed on that date, we'd both have gone our respective ways. And even if we had kissed, none of it would have happened if I had fortitude in my resolves and stuck to The Plan. I've never been happier to be wrong.