When Life Comes Full Circle, Part II

To read the first installment go to Part I

Here we were at the end of the school year of 1995. Josh and I had grown so much in our relationship. We were best friends as well as boyfriend and girlfriend. I really felt that he was the one that I wanted to be with for the rest of my life. We never talked about that really, but I think we both felt it. We really never fought, and we understood each other so very well. He truly was my one and only.

My degree was a bachelor of science degree in secretarial administration with a minor in English. Before I went to Atlanta to enter the working world, I decided that I wanted to go spend a summer working as a counselor at a camp. A few of my close friends were going to be working there, so I figured it would be a lot of fun to do as one last hurrah of my college years. Josh's family needed help at the church they were at, so he went home to work with the youth group that summer.

Despite all of my high hopes, that summer proved to be very, very hard on our relationship. We could only talk about once a week when I had an off day. We were both experiencing such different things that summer and it was hard for us to relate to each other. I started questioning things, and I believe he was as well. It was just a really weird time in our lives. At the end of the summer, I was planning to go back up to visit Stone Rose Meadow and the Fishers again.

August came, and up to Michigan I went. I was much more comfortable with his family, and we really had a great time together, but all throughout, the strain that the summer had put on my relationship with Josh was really showing when we were alone. Finally one day, we went for a long walk on the dirt road that they lived on. We sat down on a bridge and began to talk things out. We knew that we were at a turning point. We had to decide whether or not we were committed to this relationship. If we were, then we were committing to be more serious than just boyfriend and girlfriend. We were committing to each other to possibly be married one day. Thankfully, we both decided that our relationship was too good to give up on. We jumped in head first and never looked back after that moment. We did not know how our story would go, but we knew that we loved each other very, very much.

I went back to Atlanta and started working as an assistant to the VP of construction for a large construction company. It was an entry-level type position, but one that taught me a lot. Josh on the other hand, decided to stay home for the school year and continue working with the youth program instead of returning to college. He had one more year of schooling left to get his degree, but that had to go on hold for awhile. This also enabled him to be able to visit me in Atlanta more and save money for our future.

There were two trips that were very memorable for me that he made. One, he came down south for Thanksgiving. I remember that being such a wonderful weekend, and we spent every moment possible together. I also remember him sending me a "fall" package earlier that fall filled with wonderful Michigan apples and loads of colorful leaves. I really missed the fall while living in the south. It was my very favorite time of year back home in Kentucky, and it was never quite the same further south. The other trip that he made was that he surprised me by coming to Kentucky for Christmas when we went up to see our family for the holidays. We got in late one night to my aunt's home, and when I walked in to my bedroom to put my stuff down, he was sitting in a chair with a Santa hat on!! I literally screamed and jumped in his arms. I couldn't believe it!! He couldn't stay very long as he had to be at home with his family, but oh, how much I missed being with him! That weekend, we took one of my favorite pictures of the two of us on an old stone cemetary wall with the snow coming down. (This may inspire me to dig it up and see if I can't post it at the end of my series. It really should be framed in our house.) The winter dragged on into spring. I was able to make a February trip to Michigan, and he made a trip south another time. Through all this time, our relationship was getting to the point that we could not stand being apart. We talked almost every day, and it was torture to say goodbye. The next time we were going to be able to see each other was going to be July 4th week.

Check back in for the next installment. . .

When Life Comes Full Circle, Part I

This is going to be a series of posts highlighting some Fisher family history until the present. Continue to check for the next installment.

About 19 years ago, a young girl of sixteen moved from the only home she had really ever known in Louisville, Kentucky, to live in Jacksonville, Florida.

It was my senior year of high school, and a very hard transition. Thankfully, I immediately met some friends, some of whom I keep in contact with to this very day. A year later, I made the decision to attend a small college in Pensacola, FL to major in secretarial administration. That decision had a big part in forming who I am today. The friends I met and the memories made are ones that will stick with me for years. During my sophomore year, unbeknown to me, a guy who was a freshman was "watching" me during my lunch break. We had a mutual friend who was supposed to introduce that guy to me, but he never did. Besides, I had a boyfriend "back home" at the time, and I wasn't really looking to date anyone else.

The next summer, I ended up breaking up with my boyfriend, and looked forward to going back to school with an open dating life. Right before school started, my friends and I went to a promotional program for our college in a little town outside of Jacksonville. The group putting on the program had been in our town the day before, but we were unable to go see them. The next night, we walk into this very, very small church with about maybe 15 pews to see the group perform. Now, this was the next to the last time they would perform, so we just squeaked in on being able to see them. In this group was four guys including one: Josh Fisher. We met all of the guys that night as hardly anyone came to the program, and we ended up talking and singing at the piano after the program. Little did I know, but Josh was that guy who had been "watching" me in the lunch room the year before. The only thing I really remember about him from that night was that he told a story about having a large family with some adopted brothers.

Back to college I go. Not long after arriving, I kept getting calls from this guy named Josh. I was never in my room, so I was very hard to get a hold of. My roommate, who also happened to be one of my very good friends, grilled this guy on why he was calling. He told her that he wanted to ask me out. The funny thing was, I didn't even remember that I had met a Josh at that program. I thought it was a guy named Josh from my computer class.

Well, finally, Josh was able to catch me in my room and he asked me out. We went out and had a blast together, laughing and really just getting along really well that first evening. Meanwhile, he asked me to go to a formal event at our college with him later that week. The only problem with that was, two or three days before the event, I got a call from his friend that Josh had broken his leg playing soccer and that he would probably be going home. I thought to myself, that was that. He was a great guy, but nothing will come of that if he is going home.

A few weeks later, I see Josh slowly crutching his way into our common hang-out area at school. I asked my friend why he was there, and she said that he didn't end up having surgery on his leg and that he was back. To my surprise, he walked up to the group of friends I was with. Something inside me told me that this may be the beginning of something new. As you can guess, we started to hang out and do everything together, but for the whole rest of the year, we really decided that we were just friends. We really truly were. We were dating in every sense of the word, but we never said those three special words, "I Love You". We both decided that we did not want to officially say those words and be boyfriend and girlfriend until we knew that we were really serious about our relationship. In May, before Josh left for traveling with the group again, we decided that we were ready to say those words and be more committed to each other. He was going out west to travel, so I got a map and traced every part of his trip, so that I could follow along. We didn't get to talk often, but when we did, it was always very late at night for me and as long of a conversation as we could have.

In August 1994, I went to visit Josh's family for the first time. They lived in Reed City, Michigan in a large farmhouse. I was extremely nervous to meet his family and experience a little bit of his life. I was a city girl, so the whole country living was pretty foreign to me. I fell in love with his family immediately, and that experience endeared him more to me. When we went back to school, our relationship grew and grew. We really didn't know what the future held for us as I was graduating in May and moving to Atlanta, Georgia, where my parents were moving that summer. Josh on the other hand was going back to Michigan to help out at home.

Check back in for more later. . .