Last One Up To Bat-part 1

So....I finally took the big leap and got married in late October 2010.  Yes I know some of you will classify this as a shocker of sorts! "Jennifer got married?!"  And I will say that the reason I wasn't married before was not because I didn't want to be married; I just hadn't found that person yet.  I now realize it was all in the plan God created for me from the get-go but I was just too stubborn to let it be......hindsight..........(I say this as I'm shaking my head back and forth).  Somehow everyone else seemed to know it too....I am suddenly reminded of the Summer of 2001 (I think it was 2001, not any later than that).  Scene set at: Miami University, Oxford Ohio.
     I had 2 roommates that summer, Sara and Trent, the three of us were sharing a 4bed/2bath apt.  On our first night there we were sitting around the living room enjoying a few adult beverages and for some reason we started talking about who would get married first and to whom, etc.  I was involved in what I thought was a serious relationship at the time and I loudly proclaimed that I would be getting married first and from the way I saw it, it would be within the next year or two and Sara and Trent should just accept this because it was the truth.  At that particular time Sara was sort of seeing someone (I think she was seriously seeing this someone but I'm not going to be the accuser!) and Trent was seeing no one.  I should also mention that I was also nicknamed Martha (after Martha Stewart) which further proved to me that I was the one that was ready to be married.

   Immediately Trent and Sara both agreed that I would not be the first one out of the three of us to be getting married.  I couldn't believe it; how could they not see that I would be the first?  The result of the discussion was that Sara would get married 1st, Trent 2nd and me last.  I disagreed entirely and I'm sure I put up quite the fight.  We graduated in 2002.  Sara got married.
    I moved in with my parents for a year after graduation, they happened to be living in Pittsburgh, PA at the time.  Yeah, a banner of a city for hospitality, not.  I worked at the local hospital as a nursing assistant; I think every old person in there talked to me about their "perfect grandson......that lives.....1000 miles away" (or was unemployed or just out of high school!)  I went on one, count it, one date that entire year.  I agreed to a date with a guy I didn't know that if memory serves me correctly was a cousin of a friend of mine.  Anyways, he was a big manager or something of a casino and was really busy all the time.  What would a girl like me do with a guy that works for a casino?  Nothing.  I knew that was a train going nowhere. And it didn't.....again, hindsight.......
    After one year my youngest brother, Wesley, and I moved to Auburn, AL so that he could start his freshman year of college and I could go back to college to become a nurse.  (that family studies degree I got in Ohio just wasn't taking me anywhere, imagine that!).  My dating life peaked from time to time but overall was pretty stagnant during my time at Auburn as well.  My mother was just sure that I was "going to find the person you're supposed to marry while you're in Auburn."  After all, this was a place just oozing with young people.  Unfortunately I didn't make a lot of contact with these young people.  My first year I was taking pre-requisites for nursing (surprisingly, ha!) a degree in Family Studies does not arm you with enough science courses to major in  nursing.  So....there I was in classes full of 18-19 year olds.  Not exactly the population I would consider for my dating age range.
   While living in Auburn I did have a few dating prospects though:  I dated this one guy from Dothan for about 2 months, that was the longest of any of my dating experiences while there.  With this one, once again.....hindsight, whew!  He was not that intelligent and was a pretty reckless person with too much daredevil and too little class.  One night while I was at work I called him and I said to him point blank, " (name), you and I both know this isn't working out but neither one of us will admit it, so I'm going to take one for the team here and call it quits, okay?"  He started laughing and said, "you're joking."  I explained that no I was not joking and he laughed some more and said that he had never had anyone say that before and that breakups were supposed to involved yelling obscenities and hanging up the phone.  I told him there was no need for all of that we just simply didn't need to be anymore.
     I had a few other experiences in Auburn, but by few I mean I can count them on one hand.  And I won't bore you with those details.  Most of it bored me too and the rest is scandal.  I ended up transferring to Southern Union to finish my nursing degree, it just made sense, academically and financially. I just wanted to be a nurse, not a rocket scientist, not even a higher practicing nurse, just a nurse. It was the right decision (finally, got something right).  And I graduated from there in 2006, left town, moved to Nashville on a whim......single, still unmarried. To my mom I said, "I am not going to find the person I'm supposed to marry here in Auburn!"  "They are all too young or already married".  Somewhere during this time my old roommate Trent.....yeah, you guessed it......found the love of his life and got married.  At least now the competition was off, I had come in dead last and I couldn't change that.
      This is part 1.  I would finish the story now but I have to go and workout.  More later.

   This is Sara and I at my wedding reception in October.  I probably have some photos from college somewhere but they are also probably in a shoebox somewhere.   I did not have a digital camera back then.  I'm not even sure you could get a cd with your developed pictures back then. But aol IM and napster were all the rage!