It’s funny to think of the little things that cement a
relationship.
For example, I knew that Brentton was going to be my husband
when we were on our first in-person date. We were in Toys R Us (yes, I know) in
the Lego section and I started to sing, “Darkness…” and he finished with “No
parents.” And as silly as that Lego Movie reference sounds, it really turned
the tide for me.
Brentton said that he knew I was the one for him when we
were still long-distance dating. During one of our instant-message type
conversations, I told him that I could handle him. In the moment, I actually
felt kind of silly saying it…but I knew I had
to say it. It was almost as if I was being told
to say it. To me, it didn’t mean all that much, but to Brentton, who had been
told by countless ex-girlfriends that they couldn’t “handle” his emotions or “handle”
his personality, being told “I can handle you,” was something he had never
heard before.
In the same way, Brentton gave me a completely different
kind of compliment one day when he told me that he liked me because I was “so
normal.” That sort of stopped me in my tracks for a moment. I had never been
called “normal” before. If you had asked me before that moment if the word “normal”
was complimentary, I would have shrugged and said no. But, for some reason, when
it first met my ears, I loved it.
I realized that I had always been considered a bit of a
class clown by my non-theatre friends, and by my family, “a drama queen,” as my
brother likes to call me. So many people had pointed out my differences, but no
one had ever identified with me enough to call me “normal.”
I guess after you’ve spent your life feeling different from
everyone, it’s nice to find someone who is just as different as you are, who finds
those differences to be well…normal.
