A Love Story continued ...

We were living in that trailer when we had to spend our first nights apart. It was Thanksgiving and …let me back up a little. Basketball season was underway. I had been practicing for quite a while and we had played a few games. I was dressing for both JV and Varsity games. So between taking a full load of classes, playing basketball and working part-time Jody and I were not seeing a lot of each other. So we were really looking forward to the Thanksgiving break. She had a couple of days off and I was going to have a break from basketball and classes. We were planning on going to her parents for Thanksgiving. All of those plans changed on Wednesday. I got word that I was being put on the travel team for the Varsity Thanksgiving tourney and the team was leaving on Wednesday afternoon. I did not think I was going on this trip, because nothing had been said in any of the practices leading up to this day.

When I got word that I was on the travel squad I only had a couple of hours before we left. I had to pack a bag and get a hold of Jody at work. I got a hold of Jody and broke the news to her. Not only was not going to be able to make the trip to her parents for Thanksgiving but we were about to spend our first night apart since the wedding. In fact it would be 3 or 4 nights. To put in perspective, remember that we had no cell phones and no internet with which to communicate. So I got on the team bus and headed off to the tourney in northeastern Indiana and Jody came home to our empty trailer. I guess the trailer wasn’t completely empty because we were dog sitting that weekend.

When we got to our destination, we checked into our hotel and then had a brief practice and shoot around in the gym. When I got back to the room I went out to a pay phone (raise your hand if you remember using a pay phone). I used a calling card and dialed the trailer. Jody answered and I discovered that Jody had been through quite the adventure. When she got home from work she decided she would go ahead and take off for her parents that night because a snow storm was headed that way. She packed and loaded the car, grabbed the dog and took off. The storm came in early and it took her an hour to go about 20 miles and it was getting worse with each mile. So she turned around came back to our trailer. When I talked with her she was already snowed in.

The next day we had a decent Thanksgiving meal and played a late game that we won. I found the pay phone and called Jody and then I felt terrible. While I had a pretty good meal, she was snowed in with the dog and ate a turkey pot pie. That was a tough night, it was even tougher for Jody. She said recently that if she wouldn’t have had the dog it would have been even worse. We won our game the next night, I made the call home and then on Saturday we lost in the championship. The bus ride home took forever, or so it seemed to me. It was well after midnight when we got back. I stepped off the bus, grabbed my bag and practically ran to our trailer. I wasn’t thinking about how tired I was, or how much snow we had, I just wanted to see my wife.

One thing that trip established was a tradition for us. That was that whenever one of us gone over night we talk on the phone. Now it is the cell phone, but even before that was available we called long distance because we wanted to hear each other’s voice. I still love hearing her voice. Email, facebook chats and texting are great, but none of them compares to hearing her voice.

Next up was our first Christmas as husband and wife. We put up a little tree in our trailer. That Christmas was …