I still can’t believe you’re Jon Starnes
So much has been happening I don’t even really know where to start.
Jonathan. So much to say about him.
So, Jon and I have been together for not quite two months. I don’t think I have ever felt so much so fast. It is the easiest relationship I have ever been in. And yeah yeah I know it’s still new, and that people will say it’s too soon to tell. But I feel like we have finally wrapped up the “honeymoon stage.” The newness is wearing off. It’s starting to just feel normal and routine, like my world has always revolved around this amazing man.
Sometimes I catch a glimpse of him when he’s not looking and I just can’t hardly believe he is mine. I have known him now for 13 long years, and I never thought we’d end up where we’re at. In middle school I used to have the biggest crush on him. We traveled in a lot of the same circles, and I would say we knew each other pretty well, but we were never really close friends. I remember sitting behind him in English class in 9th grade. I’d pull out his pony tail and play with his long golden hair. My mom has called him pony tail Jon for as long as I can remember. But I knew him before his hair was long, so it must have started much later than I remember.
In 5th grade at a class party the teacher, Mrs. Pauttler, let us play whatever music we wanted. I think it was a Valentine’s Day party. Me and my best friend, Liz Mincks, couldn’t get enough of Brittney Spears and Christina Agulaira at the time. At one point in the party, the poppy girly music was replaced by… the worst noise I’d ever heard. I went and asked Mrs. Pauttler what the heck we were listening to. She told me that everyone was taking turns picking the music and it was Jon’s turn for a while. I marched right up to him and demanded to know what atrocious CD he was forcing us all to listen to. I remember him looking at me like he couldn’t believe what he was hearing. He juat blinked a couple of times and asked “Really? You’ve never hears of Aerosmith?”
In fact, I had not ever heard of Aerosmith, who he still sometimes listens to today. But I never forgot how much I hated them from that moment forward. I don’t think I heard a single Aerosmith song from that party in 5th grade until I started hanging out with Jonathan again a couple of months ago. I asked if he remembered that class party, and he didn’t but he sure had a good laugh when I told my side of the story.
In September of this year, he and I made plans to go running. But I finally met a man who procrastinates as much as I do, so by the time we both got out to the park we agreed to meet at, it was getting dark, and rain drops were starting to fall from heavy clouds. We tried running through the dirt paths in the woods, but the leaves above us blocked out what little light the moon was trying to lend, and the rocks under our feet were getting slick with the rain. We slowed to a walk, the rain soaking through our clothes. It was cold, but we stayed and we talked for a long time.
After a while we decided to leave. Somehow we ended up sitting on the swings in the rain at our old elementary school. We sat and sipped on vodka and whiskey and talked about the past, trading memories of one another. We laughed about people we both knew, and wondered aloud what happened to whats-her-name and did you hear about so-and-so? We sat and talked for hours, and after the alcohol had taken it’s toll, Jon asked me to dance.
I am not much of a dancer, and I warned him of this, making excuses not to, reminding him there was no music. He took my hand, and pulled me to my feet. He started to sing as I stumbled over his feet, and giggled from embarrassment.My mind was reeling with a mix of emotions and feelings, worry even. It made me nervous to have this boy I’d seen grow into a man with his hand pressed to the small of my back. He was goofy and animated as he sang. He didn’t seem nervous or the least bit shy. He just sang to me and twirled me around on the black top where we had shared so many memories before. In all that time I never thought we’d share a moment quite like this.
Days turned into weeks and soon we were inseparable. We were finding every reason to be together, which is how I ended up meeting his mother for the first time. Even though we’d known each other forever, and my family knew him well, I had never met his. Jon, and his mom, Pam, were moving. I offered to swing by to help them out, and started helping Jonathan pack up his room. You learn a lot about a person when you go through every single thing they own. I learned that Jon is a huge pack rat, much like myself. While going through stacks of old papers we found an old Christmas card I gave him in 2005 and a birthday card from 2006. I was surprised but happy to see he had pieces of us from the past. I don’t even really remember ever giving him cards, but I really liked him back then so I guess it makes sense.
It’s crazy to be with someone I have known for so long, that knows the people I know, that knew me and liked me before I was the person I am now. It’s like he knows a part of me that most people never will, that every one else missed out on. I have never met anyone that gets me the way this man gets me, or that makes me laugh the way he makes me laugh. He reminds me to be this person I’ve always wanted to be, but some how I always fell short before now. He is the missing piece to my life and myself. He was there all along just waiting to be noticed. And sometimes I stop and look at him, and think to myself “I can’t believe you’re Jon Starnes.”
