ten days.

you're leaving.  you're leaving in ten days for two entire years.  it scares me a little bit.  maybe it even makes my heart skip a couple beats and it maybe possibly makes me feel like i have an eyelash stuck on my eyeball.  that's two years without you. which is really long.  but i'm really really trying to make it seem really short.  twenty-four fast sundays, right? every sunday feels like a fast sunday.  that's only one hundred and four weeks... which isn't too many, right? right. right. right. this isn't too bad, right? oh yeah, right. we can do this, we're good. i'm good, you're good, we're good. we can do this.

all i want to say is you make me happy.  it's the way you hold my hand and brush back my hair. it's the way you crookedly smile and laugh with me.  it's the way you grab my hand and waltz with me in the kitchen.  its the way you tackle me to the floor and wrestle me.  it's the way you tickle me and pinch me and it's the way you crack funny-occasionally-sexual jokes at me.  it's the way you get all my weird jokes and the way you answer every question no matter how awkward it should be.  it's the way we are never awkward around each other and it's the way you love me. and the way i love you.

you're my best friend. for real. and i'm not just saying that because it may or may not seem like the most correct thing to say at this time.  i mean it. i really do.  you're my best friend in this entire, giant universe.  out of the nine billion people in the world, you are my best friend. yes. you. and i wouldn't trade what we have for anything.  even a bajillion dollars. even six bajillion dollars, even an infinite amount of fourteen-zillion dollar bills. yeah, i'd choose you.

you're the best. i heart you...

love, b.

p.s. we're gon get real good at letter writing.

p.p.s. the date above is wrong. i don't exactly know why. this was written november 27, 2011. thank you and have a nice day.

i knew nothing of romance but it was love at second sight.

you.  the boy who always told me i was unique.  i remember.  i remember the first time i "met" you.  it was through facebook and it made me feel scared because you are unbelievably attractive. you told me you were on a golf scholarship hundreds of miles from me.  i pretended not to be, but i was amazed.  i remember you telling me you were coming home to turn in your mission papers.  i remember that spirit you had, the spirit that was so strong it began to influence my life.  i remember one night, while sitting in a haunted chair in a cemetery, i received a text message from you.  i remember my heart skipping a beat when i read the words "i'm home. where are you?" i'd never met you and i was afraid, so i told you where i was then left.  i remember you telling me the next day how you had gone to that place to meet me, but i wasn't there.  i remember the first time we really met.  it was at a rugby game and i was with my little brother. i was in a purple summer dress and you were in basketball shorts and a t-shirt.  we stood awkwardly and i wondered what you were thinking, but i was too afraid to ask.  i remember going to the park with my brother and sitting on the swings for hours just talking.  i remember flying kites and rolling on the grass and eating wendy's.  i remember the first time we held hands. we were at a concert and i was so afraid.  you were the mystery man.  i remember when you finally grabbed my hand how the tinglies wouldn't stop shooting through my body.  i remember.  i remember the golfing, the golf cart racing, the putting practice, hot chocolate in the clubhouse, vacuum buying with your sisters, secret late-night phone calls about stargazing.  i remember roasting marshmallows and wearing your jacket and i remember it smelling just like you.  i remember looking up at the stars and i remember you putting your hands in my pockets to hold my hands.  i remember when you almost kissed me, but didn't.  and i remember when i almost fell in love with you, but didn't. and i remember when we were almost best friends, but weren't.  i remember everything.  and now, i ride my bike to the mailbox every single day in hopes of a letter from my best friend in washington.  i keep your letters in a secret shoe box and i read them when i'm sad.  i am constantly thinking of what to send you in your next package and every time i see a quote about a missionary or a song about love gone away, i think about you.  i think about you all the time. and i just think you should know, you amaze me.  every single day, you're amazing. 

b.

748 miles.

ventura, california. ventura, california. ventura, california.

ventura, california is where he's going. 748 miles away. for 730 days. that's 24 fast sundays. that's 104 weeks. that's so many seconds and minutes and hours that i am going to be away from him and he's going to be away from me. it's two years of letters and notes and little packages and thoughts about how he's doing and where he is and what he's thinking.  that's 24 months of my secret conflicting wishes that he's thinking of me and his duty at the same time.  that's 17,520 hours of baking cookies that will taste like tin by the time they get to him, traveling to california and wishing that i could see him, school with boys that i pretend to like. it's college, it's family, it's changing dreams and changing culture. it's new movies that i won't see with him and sentences that i'll have to hold in my immediate "that's what she said" because he's the only one who understands. it's the absence of his cologne and the farewell to his constant guitar playing. it's the text messages that lower and the free phone minutes that raise. it's the concerts with different people that i don't know how to sing around, and the tim mcgraw loving that will seem to disappear. it's two entire years. two years that everything will change.

it's two years we can make it through, me in the snow and him on the beach. it's two years that will make me better at letter-writing and package sending. it's two years of figuring out myself and him becoming a bigger man. it's only two years. it's only 24 fast sundays and 17,520 hours. it's only that long.

only two years and 748 miles.

b.

sometimes... things just feel perfect.

the other day i was having a lonely day. i had just finished a test at school and was about to come home when i received a text that said "you should come visit me." he always, without fail, texts me the right thing at the right time.

of course he was golfing... he always is... so i went to visit him at the golf course.  that morning i showered, got out of the shower, and literally did nothing with my hair.  it was a curly, wavy mess.  the moment i stepped onto the putting range (if that's even what you call it)...

he told me i looked pretty.

he couldn't have said anything more perfect.  he made my day.  i'm so lucky to have someone like him in my life.

p.s. he's getting his call for his mission in less than a week! eek!

b.