our story [part 2]

Read Part 1 here.

At age 18, I moved away to college at Arizona State University.  It was only two hours away, but it was the hardest transition of my life. 

New dorm.  New friends.  New life.

 

Exciting, yes, but also positively terrifying.

Time flew by, however, and I dated quite a few boys throughout the months away from home.  I didn’t date any of them very seriously except for one, and I got him ready and sent him off on a church mission, determined that I would be there when he got back two years later.

Sometimes I think about those times now and imagine Heavenly Father giving me his knowing smile and maybe even chuckling slightly, because my life wouldn’t turn out anything like I’d planned.

And I’m glad it didn’t.

During the summer before my senior year at ASU, though still faithfully writing that missionary I’d worked so hard to get out there, I started to have small inklings that maybe I should start dating again.  I pushed these feelings aside, bound and determined that I wasn’t going to date anybody right then.

The inklings came and went throughout the summer months, but I mostly managed to squelch them in the midst of all my letter-writing and adventure-having.

On one evening in June sometime, I went to go hang out with a group of my guy friends at their house.  I was having trouble finding the place in the dark, so I called my friend Jon.  He walked out to my car to show me inside.  As we were walking up to the front door, I saw a darkened figure sitting on the bed of a truck in the driveway, talking on the phone.

“Who’s that?” I asked.

“Oh that’s just Tim, our roommate.”

I dismissed him without another thought.

A few minutes later, however, this “Tim” walked through the front door, and to my utter surprise, I recognized him.

“Hey don’t I know you?” I asked in shock.

“Oh yeah, you’re Jeff Sparks’s little sister, aren’t you?”

Of course, I thought.

He spent the rest of the night in the same room with my friends and me, but he didn’t say much.  A short sentence or two, here or there.  They showed me their band’s website.  To my surprise, they were pretty good.

“Who’s singing?” I asked.

“Oh that’s Tim,” Gary said.

“Really?” I asked.

“Yep,” Tim said.  And that was it.  So he’s the silent musician type, I thought.

As soon as I left their house, however, Tim exclaimed, “Well Katie Sparks sure has grown up a lot!”  After which his roommates all tried to discourage him by telling him I was waiting for a missionary.

When I got home, I asked Tim to be my friend on Facebook, and then quickly forgot about him.  Again.


Read Part 3 here.

our story [part 1]

My life collided with Tim’s at age six.  Two years later I had a teensy crush.  Six years later we moved away and I forgot about him.  And another ten years after that, he asked me to marry him.

Would you like to hear the story?

My family moved to Yuma, AZ in the record-hot summer of 1995, and my parents vaguely wondered what they had gotten themselves into.  The natives of Southern California just weren’t used to 122 degree weather, after all.

But kids are resilient, and before long, my brothers and I adapted to the scorching heat with no noticeable problems. 

My mom, however, was determined that we would only live in Yuma for five years – just long enough for my dad to get established in his job as a professor at the local community college.  She couldn’t stand the heat for any longer than it took to walk to the car, touch the blazing steering wheel, and turn on the seemingly heaven-sent A/C.

We attended our local church’s congregation, and my older brother, Jeff, became acquainted with another eight-year-old boy named Timmy Devey.  I was vaguely aware of the boy named Timmy but my interest in Barbies and fear of the school bus largely drowned out any notice I would have taken of him.

Around age eight, however, I started to notice Timmy.  He went to a different school than I did, but I saw him at church.  I saw how he made the other kids laugh, how he seemed to be in the “cool kid” crowd, and how cute he looked in his church clothes.

Mind you, I was noticing those kinds of things about 90% of the other older boys, too.

But I always had a slight crush on the boy named Timmy.

The funny thing is, Tim tells me now that he remembers my little brother, Eric, better than he remembers me, because he was so loud and obnoxious.  In fact, he barely remembers me at all.  [Maybe I should have been more obnoxious.]

Here is a picture of Tim with his mouth stuffed full of marshmallows at my brother’s birthday party.  
And there I am two seats away from him.

Six years after moving to Yuma, my mom finally got her wish.  My dad had gotten another job in Prescott, AZ, and my brothers and I were [mostly] excited to move and start something new.

I said goodbye to all 36 of my crushes, and we packed up our things and moved in the summer of 2001.

I largely forgot about Timmy because there were just too many other cute boys to notice.

I do, however, remember thinking about him once at around age 16.  I bet if Timmy saw me now, all grown-up, he might actually notice me, I thought.

And then I quickly forgot about him again.


Continue on to Part 2.

the secrets of panda express

Last week [I think - I'm losing track of my days], Tim and I went to Panda Express.  We usually get to meet up on Fridays for lunch because we get out of our classes at the same time and can eat together before we head to work.

Not that you really cared about that useless piece of information.

But I really like it.

Anyways.

I got an awesome fortune cookie that said:


Your sense of humor will get you through difficult times.

I felt all warm and fuzzy inside.

[I really only go to Panda for the fortune cookies.] [Just kidding.] [Kind of.]

Then Tim went to open his fortune cookie...

...and there was no fortune!

We felt so gypped.  And then puzzled.

Does Tim have no future?  Or can he just choose his own destiny?  And whereas I am doomed to having my sense of humor get me through difficult times, maybe he can choose to just be depressed during difficult times if he so wishes?

Perhaps we'll never know.

p.s.  In regards to my last blog, I have a clarification.  That first picture?  Of my new bedspread?  I did not make that.  [I owe all of that to Target.]  And I did not make the fish blanket.  Or the blanket from my mom [of which there was no picture].  In fact, I have never made a blanket.  My only talents lie in being able to blog about inconsequential nonsense.  [But thankfully, I still get to enjoy the fruits of other people's talents.]

Ok, just had to be sufficiently humble, in case there was any confusion.

Ok.  Ok bye.