Sweet Eugene's

This morning I'm at the local coffee establishment in College Station, Texas, Sweet Eugene's. Growing up in a town like this, if you don't drink, you drink coffee, so "Sweets" was like a second home to me. Being at home, traipsing through my dusty old haunts, always gets me thinking about the might-have-beens. Especially somewhere like here, where half of my high school graduating class stayed to attend either Texas A&M or the local community college, it's easy to feel like the oddball for leaving.

It's good to see the people, though. This week, I got my girls together--there are four of us, whom the guys we ran with called the "Gruesome Foursome." I like to think of us as the College Station version of the Sex and the City girls. Though the sexual part of it really doesn't compare, I'd argue that our conversations are just as delightful. True to form, when we get together, the topic eventually turns to relationships. With each of us 21, three years into college, Sallie's engaged, Cat dating someone and Mitzi and I are up in the air. The stats are actually really surprising, but easy to explain. Two of us left College Station, so that's why we may not have four weddings to attend next summer. Of course I say "may" because there's no telling what could happen in the next year.

Thankfully, since our lives went in so many directions, we talk about more than just wedding plans (although it's funny to hear Sallie muse about her future as a pastor's wife and the difficulties of registering). Among our discussions were the problems with abstinence-only education, Texas education in general, the upcoming election, breast exams, local beers, ministry, and so forth. At one point we started to rag on "those guys" who join some of the more extreme Christian groups on campus, like the Christian fraternity BUC's (Brother's Under Christ) or some of the larger churches (ie: mine, Grace Bible). For many reasons, I hesitate to jump on the bandwagon against any of these poor souls, but it's easy to make fun of the quite dramatic version of courtship that takes place between a boy of that caliber and his chosen. It goes something like this:

Boy sees girl across the room at some church or Christian group function. Boy quietly and carefully observes girl for a semester or so. Sometimes this involves actually talking to the girl, but only in the most friendly, casual manner, perhaps at a Bible study meeting or game of Ultimate Frisbee. All the while, he prays, asking God to reveal to him whether this beauty is indeed the woman that God has chosen for him to pursue as a wife. Once he feels confidant that God is telling him to initiate a relationship with her, he begins some research. If she's local (like me), it won't be hard for him to contact her father in person, otherwise email will have to do. If he can snag Papa's permission, he approaches the girl for a DMI--a conversation in which he will "define my intentions." Provided she accepts, they begin a period of courtship, entailing some upright and moral date activities (that means in large groups or very public places, no rated-R movies or "pagan" concerts, etc) and a sufficiently lengthy list of physical limitations (no interdigitating fingers until after six weeks, never being alone together at either person's apartment after dark...you know, the basic stuff). The courtship phase continues as such until some point within the couple's last year of school, sooner if the parent's permit, when he proposes and they marry.

We all laugh. "How dramatic!" And, "Who would ever do something like that?" "It puts too much pressure on things." All heads nod in agreement. As enlightened college women, such conservative ideals are more faded than the found-on-the-side-of-the-road coffee house couches upon which we used to sit, back when we believed them. More condescending laughter, when I speak up: "Let's be honest, if I had stayed, I'd probably be dating one of those guys." We all laugh and agree.

Let's be honest, if I had stayed, I'd be sporting my own left-hand diamond. Because in this town, if you are cute and love Jesus, they don't let you out alive...er, alone. And every time I come back, I have to ask myself that same question: am I really happy that I left? Yeah yeah, we rag on the idea of courtship and how seriously people take relationships, but if it had been my story, I'm sure it would seem quite romantic and very, very normal. But, since, in Cali, that's not how we do, making fun of the system staves off the jealousy.

Last Saturday, I ran into my 1st grade teacher, who asked if I "had a beau in my life." She followed up to my negative reply with, "What's the problem?" She may have added, sensing my awkwardness, an afterthought, "...with the boys in California?" but by that point, my eyes had already glazed over as I tried to compensate with some garble about how things are different out there. I don't see why archaic ideas about marrying young or others' choices to do so have to demean my own successes. It's dumb that I feel like there's only so much happiness to go around--as if people getting married here somehow takes away my ability to be happy. And do I really want that story? There's no way I would have found my voice, my self, if I had stayed. I think God directed me outward because He knew my happiness required a different route. I'm the other kind of cliche--the one who has to leap, full-force, out of the nest, crossing my fingers that I can figure out my wings on the way down, before it's too late.

And man does it feel good to fly.