The Story of Us: Part 3

It’s been so fun re-telling Kyle’s and my love story! Last week, after sharing Part 2, the girls and I were driving somewhere, and I started to flip through radio stations. This song was playing on one of the stations. It took me back to that first summer. I hadn’t thought about it in years, but Kyle played it allll the time in that gold mini-van he borrowed from his parents for the summer. If you missed the earlier parts, you can catch up on those here and here. 🙂 And today we dive into Part 3!

Three Summers

After that first summer at camp, Kyle and I worked at Highland together two more summers. Over those 3 summers, I came out of my shell a ton. I’ve lost a lot of my shyness, thanks to the friendships I made and the experiences we shared at camp. I really owe a huge part of who I am to my seven total summers working at Highland! Kyle became a good friend of mine.

By the end of our third summer working together, I definitely 100% liked him, but there was no way that I was going to be the one to bring it up. I was in my second year of nursing school at Eastern Mennonite University, and I knew that he was about to begin ministry school in South Carolina. It didn’t make sense to speak up!

Treachorous Roommates

So, I kept silent the whole summer. And so did he. The summer ended. We went opposite directions. I moved into my dorm room at EMU, and he ventured to the Carolinas. I threw myself into nursing school, and he had ministry school boot camp. I had clinicals and exams where anyone else’s C was an F (nursing school is not easy, my friends!). He had faith trips and wild Friday night worship services.

But, no matter how I tried, I couldn’t ignore the feeling that I wasn’t supposed to just let this guy go. I’ve always been far better at writing out my thoughts than talking them out, so, to get the words out of my system, I wrote him a letter. A letter, mind you, that I had no intention of actually sending. A letter that told him exactly how I felt.

My dear friend convinced me to at least get his address, which I did. And then she put the letter in the mail!! Then, one week later, my phone rang. It was Kyle. He’d read the letter and was calling to tell me that he liked me, too.

Now, before we all smile and say, “AWWW!!” let me just say here and now that it wasn’t that simple. Not even then. We decided to just keep in touch since we were 5 hours apart and very busy with our respective schooling. The key here is that we were both committed to staying friends. And that’s what we did. We talked on the phone weekly and saw each other a couple of times. But nothing “official” happened.

Not for another 5 years.

But I guess you’ll just have to come back next week for that part of the story! 😉