What and If...6 years with you

"'What' and ‘if’ two words as nonthreatening
as words come. But put
them together side-by-side and they
have the power to haunt you for the
rest of your life: ‘What if?'..."

But I know that if what you felt
then was love - true love ...I hope you had the
courage to seize it..."

...You need only the courage to
follow your heart..."

(Taken from "Letters to Juliet")

When I met Brian, I was an 18 yr-old on a mission. I had two years left to earn my Bachelor's and had aspirations to teach English in Japan for a year to save up money for a mission. When I got back from my mission, it was off to graduate school! I had a plan. A plan is what kept me from getting sucked into this "gotta-get-married" fever everyone around me had. I wanted love like anyone else would, to be in a relationship, but I didn't want it to consume me. Still, I had been in a few relationships since starting at BYU-I and with each heartbreak came a comforting hold on to my plans, that the relationships never would have worked in my plans so it didn't matter.

Then I met Brian. I felt like he was unlike any man I had met. There was a real connection and I felt I let my guard down, and he was OK with the me he saw. Well, I guess more than OK- in love with me. As I truly was. I still talked about my plans with him but I realized the "what if's" that I did not want to have to live with were, "What if I go to Japan and leave him?" "What if I end this for my plans?"

I also remember now that while we were still dating, not even engaged, it came time for me to declare my preferences for my student-teaching locations the next Spring (about 1 year in advance of my student teaching). Again, "What if I go to Arizona or Las Vegas?" 

Instead, I decided to seize him, my true love. And it has been the best decision of my life.