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By Jon Date: 2003 Feb 20 Comment on this Work [[2003.02.20.09.35.10610]] |
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I met Mindy in a cafe near the school where the kids who liked to believe they had style hung out. The cafe had an open mic night every Saturday night and people mostly read poetry. These were the kids who believed they had style afterall...like me. Anyway, one night I decided to read some of my stuff. I got up there and read a piece called "Wake Up Call". Basically it's about me dreaming I'm with Lynda but not sure if it is a dream or not. Pretty much a lucid dream. I didn't get any applause, but I could tell by the somber look on their faces it at least connected to some. I got off the stage and this girl was waiting for me at the end of the steps. She introduced herself as Mindy and told me she liked my style. I said I liked it too. Sure, Mindy was beautiful but I had been bad at jugding character before but I gave her my cell phone number anyway. It wasn't a spectacular moment, but it had all that ackwardness of a relationship that lasts. I kept going back to the cafe every Saturday night and she was always there in the audience and we always talked afterwards. And this routine ended up going on for awhile until one night. I was on stage and I had just fantastically failed at a standup act and I was walking off the stage when I noticed she wasn't there. I called her and asked her why she wasn't there and she told me "It doesn't matter anyway, you never really notice me." And that's when I realized how much of an effect this girl was having on me and I never even knew it. "But, I..." "But you what Jon?" "I missed you." (Silence) "I missed you too." We held hands for the first time a week later, kissed shorty after that, and fell in love right after that and I asked her to marry me shorty after that. She made me so happy and I could tell I was making her happy too. We had everything in common and the conversation never lags between us. I had been in love before, but not like this and not like this ever again. Sometimes moments in your life that you have lived just make sense. It may not seem like it at the time, but things happen for a reason. If I had never broken my knee I would have never worked at Bath and Body and I would never have met Stacey. If I had never met Stacey I wouldn't have gone to UCLA and met Lynda. If I had never met Lynda I would had never written as much poetry as I did and I would have never set foot in that cafe. If I had never gone into that cafe I wouldn't have met Mindy. If I hadn't met Mindy, well then I don't think I would be as happy as I am now. Life is a journey, and by no means is my journey through yet. I just have a clearer vision of where I'm headed, where I've been, and where I am right now. Before I didn't like the idea of fate. I didn't like thinking I wasn't in control of where I was headed. But I got fate all wrong, fate isn't about controlling your destiny, but rather fate is direction. Sometimes during the day I look down at my worn out knee and I smile and remember to just be thankful. And I am. |