My One

May 1994, I was driving down to Minford to see my girlfriend at the time.  I was pretty cocky and started talking to God.  I said that I was the most successful person my age that I knew.  I was the best officer at our mortgage company.  The new Circleville branch was dying, and they gave it to me to try to save; and it became the most successful office, beating Portsmouth and the home office in Chillicothe.  They opened seven new branches off the profits made at my Circleville office.  See…very cocky, but true.  I had a new car, new clothes, pocket full of money, and I just bought my first building.  It was a historical landmark and I lived on the upper floor.  I had a tenet on the main floor and a giant garage in the back that was used to store limousines for Mike Cantrell, the owner of the company.

Anyway, I was driving, and I said to God that since I had everything in this life I could want, I want Him to come back into my life like He used to, and that way I could have everything in this life and the next.  I asked for Him to come into my life.

Three things happened the following week:

1. That drive to Minford would be the last time I saw my girlfriend.  She packed up and split, which set the stage for the next two events.

2. Mike, the owner, was caught cheating in a hotel with my sister’s best friend.  His wife found out and since everything was in her name, it was over.  Mortgage company gone.

3. My mom met me at a bar and told me she was having an affair on my dad.  It was with one of my co-workers at the mortgage company.  That was the doozy.  It was May 14, 1994.

no girlfriend, no job, no family = one week. 

I was dumbfounded.  What just happened?  I stayed in my apartment building and went through the motions, but I knew that I had lost and the world had moved on.  Everybody around me knew it too.  I spent the rest of the summer and fall alone.  Thanksgiving came and went by myself, then Christmas.  It’s strange to know, not as an emotional reaction, but just as a cold fact that if I had died months ago, nobody would’ve noticed.  That’s a weird place to be.  I remember I would get home every night and watch Mystery Science Theater 3000 for two hours before I went to sleep.  It was always funny, but I never laughed anymore.  Strangely, like Peter Pan losing his shadow, I lost my laugh.

Anyway, I started to give up.  I remember I used to spend a lot of time looking out the window at all of the activity of main st. below and the Sack&Save grocery store across the street.  The people that were in my life thought life now was better without me and I coldly agreed. 

But something happened.  When everyone else left, and I gave up, someone stayed behind.  I could feel that someone was still interested in me, and I didn’t understand why.  Sometimes I still ask him why did he still care back then, it would have been so easy just to forget and give up.  I’ve objectively ruined my life, everyone knows it, and I’ve accepted it.  It would be so easy.  Why are you still here?

I was alone and God never left me.  There was a very dark night when I was done, and he was there.  Funny-dark anecdote:  I intended to fall asleep permanently, but an impromptu party broke out in my apartment building with people just showing up, drinking and having a wild time, including in my bedroom.  So, people were partying sitting on my bed with me as I started to fall asleep…very Socrates, right?  God set the stage and was there so intently that I woke up the next day like Rip Van Winkle.

After that we worked hand-in-hand and built my life together again, with Him.  And we’ve been together ever since, just like I asked for on that car ride many months before.

That’s one great reason why I belong to Him.  When I was alone, who left and who stayed?  One stayed behind.  My One.  That’s why I’m toast, I’m totally in the bag for Him.  Because He is wonderful.  God loves me; He was there.

…fast forward, Hippie moved in with me for a while; then Lee and Veronica moved in with little Leigh-Anna and we ended up renting a nice house together.

It was then that I was ready, and God introduced me to Holli, my wife and best friend for twenty-six years now.  And for her story you can refer to the rest of this website, for as the old poet said:

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“In that book which is my memory,

on the first page of the chapter that is the day when I first met you,

appear the words, ‘Here begins a new life.’.”

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p.s. I got my laugh back.  The three of us laugh together all the time.