In the past month life has been a crazy awesome adventure. Right before Christmas I flew out to New Mexico to see my best friends and was pleasantly surprised to be surprised by my girl friend being there. My friends had flown her out there so we could
have the whole break together. Surprises like that are wonderful memories made and really mean a lot to me, because it says myfriends really love and care about us! After a few days in New Mexico we flew up to Seattle, Washington to spend Christmas with her family. While we were there I asked Megan to Marry me and she said YES!
Those days leading up to asking her were nerve racking and exciting. After talking to her parents her Dad asked me what I would have done if he had said “No”, and my response was “Well… I guess it would make for a awkward couple of days”. But when her parents said “Yes”, I just felt this huge relief and for the first time in months I could really relax. I had bought the ring a few months ago and sometimes I have a hard time holding a secret, especially when it’s something really exciting. It’s even harder when the secret you are keeping is for someone you love and talk to everyday.
So on December 22, 2012 I could wait no longer, Megan and I went on a date night to Lights of Christmas, which is this christmas light display put on by a camp where Megan use to work. I had the ring in my pocket hoping there might be a place romantic enough, but as we walked around and saw the lights there were just to many people around. From
there we went out to dinner and headed back to her house. When we got there we went out to take pictures under the lights her family had put on in the front yard, after taking a few of our goofy pictures I bent down on a knee while she was looking at the pictures on the camera, as I went to pull out the ring she handed me the camera, I dropped the camera and han
ded her the ring.
The only thing I really remember saying was “Will you marry me Megan and go on this journey of life with me?”, She just smiled at me and said “yes!”
I won’t forget looking back at the house and seeing her parents peaking through the window on the front door as
they oowed and aaahhed. Over the past year Megan and I have taken a lot of pictures and tried to capture the memories
of our time together. One of my favorite songs titled “All the memories” by the band The Classic Crime says
“Oh, all the memories we had
Framed in our minds like photographs
Take a second, take a second
And make this last
Here where the future meets the past
I can never fall in love again
I can never fall in love again”
All our memories are framed like photographs in our minds and hearts. That whole night I was looking for the right spot and the right time to ask. For months I had lost sleep over trying to figure out a plan or what it might look like, but now looking back at it a few weeks later, it was the perfect moment and I couldn’t have planned it. It wasn’t until we were our goofy selves, taking pictures and laughing about the faces we were making that the opportunity was right. I can say, I will never fall in love with anyone again because I found the one that I want to love. Our relationship has been anything but easy, the long distance and short bursts of time that we have been able to spend together over the past year have stretched us and challenged us. It has been emotionally draining at times and everyday we have had to believe and fight for the hope to carry on, but isn’t that what love is all about. About fighting for what we believe in, over everything else and forgiving when it just hurts.
Love isn’t some fluffy idea of an little naked angel on a cloud shooting lonely hearts with arrows. Love isn’t just a word that middle school students throw around to mean whoever they have a crush on that week. Love isn’t just attraction, or a spiritual fruit or 60’s
rock n’ roll song lyric. Love is not something we will ever fully grasp or understand. Love is giving everything we got, sharing evenwhen it doesn’t seem fair, driving forty miles to find cold medicine when she’s sick, writing letters on what ever paper you can find including paint samples, moving half way across the country in faith that God will close the space between where you and her are because you believe God called you there, Love is calling back five minutes after they said something that made you mad and responding with I love you. Love is always, always, always a learning process that will take more time than we have and always have something new to teach us everyday. My assumptions of trying to understand love have been reshaped by my relationship and everyday is framing new memories to learn from and enjoy.
-Caleb Ross Hunter
The Adventure of Dragon Hunting 