MFEO - Part V

Inspiring isn't it?

The clothes we wore that night.
(Scott on the left, Rebekah on the right)

Going into date 3 (including the bike ride) I was prepared to pull out all the stops. I planned a killer of an evening complete with a vegetarian dinner (Scott comes from a carnivorous family) and a trip out to the Utah West Desert to see the Spiral Jetty. Oh yes. Wow, do I know how to charm a man or what?

Not only do I feed Scott what is possibly his first vegetarian dinner of his life, I also make him help cook it. Just as I fired up the ol' grill the door bell rang and before he knew what was happening there he was chopping vegetables. To tell you the truth, that grilled vegetable pasta that I made that night is now one of his favorite dinners. Bless him.

So far, so good. After dinner we hop into my Dad's pickup truck and head off for one of Utah's more obscure claims to fame: the Spiral Jetty. A literal gem of the 1970's, I had been there twice before and just couldn't wait to get back! Ok, not really. But it was a chance to share some art (I was an art history major after all) with Scott and get outside for a bit. Little did we know that my brilliant plan would also end up meaning 6 hours of car time. That's right. Rebekah thought she knew exactly how to get there but .... she didn't. After asking directions from a woman wearing a coyote t-shirt whose house had one of those cowboy silhouettes out front ("Spiral what?!") we eventually found ourselves on the right road. By now it is 9:30 and pitch black. The road is more like a series of huge dirt pot holes studded with boulders the truck is barely tall enough to go over.

Looking back it was amazing that neither Scott nor I were totally stressed out at this point. We had actually had a nice talk during our scenic drive of the desert but to be completely honest we were a little tired of sitting so we decided to bag the Spiral Jetty and just get out and walk on the dirt road (even more romantic, yes!).

So we get out and start walking. Because we were roughly 60 miles from any source of electricity, there was no light pollution and the stars were brilliant which made me feel a little better since my carefully planned date turned out to be somewhat less than what I had imagined. We had been walking for a few minutes talking about the stars and how quiet it was when Scott said "Rebekah, could I ask you a question?". I said that of course he could. At this point I stop breathing. He then said "Do you think we could ever be more than just friends?" Between not breathing and my heart rate doubling I'm surprised I was able to keep walking. I then told him that I thought he was one of the greatest guys I've know and that I would love to be more than just friends. As I was talking I had started to walk faster and faster. When I was done and Scott was almost jogging to keep up with me I asked him "What do we do now?" Scott responds with "Well we could stop walking for a start."

At this point I can't explain all the emotions I was feeling. The two major ones were absolute joy that Scott liked me and nervousness so severe I was shacking. You see this was all new to our little Rebekah. Never had a boyfriend, never kissed, never held hands, nothing. And then Scott gently took my face in his hands and kissed me on the cheek and then pulled me into a hug. All my nervousness went away and I believe that moment was the happiest of my life.

I don't know how long we stood leaning against the truck talking and holding each other but it was long enough to see a couple of trains go by in the distance. We talked about why we liked each other and all the grief we had gone through the past month and a half, not knowing how the other one felt. It was wonderful.

Now it was getting close to midnight and we had a 7:00 am Church meeting the next morning so we decided to head home. Between Scott holding my hand and me always wanting to look at him it's amazing we got home in one piece. But the worst that happened was we got lost again and had to stop for directions.

After I dropped him off (big hug but no kiss) I drove home and rushed up to my parent's bedroom and threw myself on their bed exclaiming "HE LIKES ME!" To this day that is one of my parent's fondest memories of me.

MFEO - Part I
MFEO - Part II
MFEO - Part III
MFEO - Part IV