This was the picture of my adult life: never married; no children; no house or fancy car. No success at all. In fact, I had just enough income to keep from drowning. But somewhere in all that misery, I had learned how to pray, study my Bible, to curate a life of quiet obedience, and be grateful.
Enter Tony. My high school sweetheart who ended our relationship to go off to college, who called me about every ten years since that time to tell me how he was doing.
Once to tell me he was married.
Once to tell me he wasn’t married anymore but that his career was flourishing, and he was able to stand on an ocean liner and witness beautiful rainbows stretch across the Pacific Ocean. I distinctly remember telling him that there were nice rainbows right here back home, to which he replied, “Not like this.”
Another time he called to tell me that he was married for a second time and now had a beautiful baby girl. He sent me her picture and I felt like I was looking at a child version of myself. I told him she was beautiful.
He called me a couple of other times over the years to express his condolences over the loss of my loved ones. The calls were short and considerate, like a sympathy card.
Eventually, my family sold our house, disconnected our phone number, and continued life in another city. Fast forward seven years. It was a typical Sunday. I had taken my mother out for a full day of shopping, dropped her off, and went back to my apartment on the other side of town to get ready for the work week.
I was unloading my dishwasher when my mother called. I thought she was calling to say that she left one of her shopping bags in my car. I mentally geared up to make the twenty-minute trip to take it to her. But then she told me the reason for her call.
“Guess who left me a message?” I was tired. I couldn’t imagine. At eighty years old, her life was about eight times more exciting than mine. It could have been anyone. Still, I wanted to be cheery and supportive. “I don’t know, who?”
“Tony! He said he had been looking for a way to contact you and wasn’t sure if this was a good number but left his phone number just in case.”
I was shocked. It had been a total of thirty-four years since our breakup: an entire lifetime. I had been so consumed with my life that I barely thought about anything else. I thought about our history together and how he had updated me over the years and quickly said to my mother, “He’s probably divorced again. I’ll call him, give him some love and support, and he’ll be on to wife number three in no time.”
I emptied the dishwasher, finished my chores, and sat down in my rocking chair. I let out a deep sigh and said, “Lord, I’m so tired of this man choosing other women over me.” And then I remembered that I needed to be cheery and supportive of him, too, even if it didn’t benefit me. So, I dialed his number.
He was in fact divorced. But he was also cheery, and supportive, of me. We laughed for two hours. And then he said something he had never said once in the thirty-four years since our breakup. “I’ll call you tomorrow, ok?” It was better than ok. I told him my simple, boring schedule and he detailed his intricate, busy one and then said, “But other than that, I’m free.”
That was in August of 2021. Three months later I became his third wife. And it feels like it should have been that way all along. I couldn’t have planned it. I couldn’t have predicted it. But God did it all. Trust Him.
1 Corinthians 1:25-29