Further Clueless Encounters

It should be noted that my beloved history teacher from high school used to tell me when certain boys liked me.

Mr. H: "Be careful with that one, he likes you."

Me: "Really? How can you tell?"

Mr. H: "I've seen the way he looks at you when you're walking in the halls together." or "He doesn't stay that long after school when you're not around."

Somehow like Mr. H, I'm fairly perceptive with my own students, in a way I never was in my own youth. For example, there were a couple times when I was in seminary when I was completely clueless. Unfortunately or fortunately depending on your perspective, Tulip Boy's praise of my beauty at such an early age made me callous and dismissive toward compliments of this nature.

So one day when I attended seminary the other kids were talking about makeup and it came out that I didn't wear any at all. One of the boys examined my face and said earnestly, "Wow. You don't wear any makeup at all?" I shook my head. "That's amazing. Your face looks perfect without it." I just shrugged my shoulders, and looked toward the teacher who was trying to get everyone's attention.

Another time in my senior year of seminary, we were having one of those ridiculous lessons where the teacher makes you write a list of qualities you want in a spouse. On came the onslaught of the raging teenage hormones called seminary students crying out for "hot" eternal companions. This rankled me, and as I was still the outspoken, woman-scorned Carrie, I said so. And I said I thought it was shallow and meaningless in the eternal scheme of things. My seminary teacher that year was fortunately very understanding of me, my outspoken-ness, and my sense of humor which was often laced with sarcasm. Except that this time I wasn't joking. And so he decided to address the issue. Because, as he proceeded to point out, it is important to be attracted to the person in bed next to you in the morning. I think I may have rolled my eyes at this because, shocker, I was stubborn, although I conceded mentally that he had a point. But my classmates wouldn't let it go. They were determined. Well, one of them was. He was a friend I had several classes with, so I was surprised when he turned to me and said, "Carrie, you're going to have a real problem if you think that hotness isn't important." I gave him a Paddington stare and asked why. "Because you're hot." It took me at least a week or more to look him in the eye again (because I was embarrassed, not because I was mad at him).

So, in other words, when I went off to college, I had only been asked on two or three dates, and double that and you get the total number of dates I had been on at all. Not that I didn't spend time with guys. I've always had a lot of guy friends, sometimes rivaling the number of girl friends, from elementary school through to today. I just didn't date, which didn't leave me any the wiser as far as encounters of the romantic kind go. I'm reminded of a one-liner from my dad, "No dating until you're 25; no marriage until you're 35." I never took him seriously, but I realize now that he has a point. But if I knew then what I know now, how would I have come to know what I know? Um, yeah.

Anyway, when I went to college, I was convinced that the trend would continue and no one would want to date me. Except suddenly this bothered me. (Especially after a bad experience that summer with a close friend who I secretly liked.) Long story short, when I went to that religious university in happy valley, I set myself up to give my heart away. And give it away I did. In the first week. Classes hadn't even started yet, but I was there a couple weeks early for a late summer honors program. And that's where I met the guy for me. He was intelligent, well-spoken, literary, musical; he loved to read, he loved to write. He was perfect. Or so I thought.

I found out too late that he had one major flaw. He didn't want the heart I gave to him. But I was oblivious to that. I should have paid attention to the fact that none of my room-mates liked him; that they found it strange that after months of this we had never kissed; that he never really talked to them when he was around; that one of my best friends whom I looked up to as a brother couldn't stand the guy. And then it should have been a clue when he started saying things like how he was so physically attracted to me, but not more. Here was exactly what I had hated in high school: the shallow physical attraction with nothing else behind it. But I couldn't see it; all I could see was how perfect I thought we were together. Utterly clueless. Fortunately for the clueless, he was the one to break it off (in an email) and then in a phone call in which he informed me that we had never been dating anyway. That subsequent week I learned a lot.

I learned that appearances can be deceiving. I learned that getting one's little innocent heart crushed really hurts, but as my bro advised me, the self-pitying is kind of fun. I learned that when the self-pitying starts to distract you in the middle of class, then there's been enough of it and it's time to stop. I learned that sometimes the decision to stop suffering is that easy when you ask the Lord to help you heal.

I also made a bargain with the Lord that the next time I gave my heart away it would be to the man I would marry. I learned that my sister loves me a lot but had no idea what she was starting when she told her friend to take me out and cheer me up. Her friend was Linus, and over the next few weeks I learned that the Lord keeps his end of the bargains we make with him. And over the next six years, I have learned that the Lord made us for each other, and His wisdom is greater than bargains. Love you, Linus. At least I'm not clueless about that.