November 21 – 26, 2000 – Thanksgiving in California

November 21 – 26, 2000 – Thanksgiving in California

My parents had not met Rob. They were in California and it’d only been 3 months now. So I invited Rob home with me for Thanksgiving. He would have stayed in Utah with his extended family, but was just as anxious as I was for him to meet my family. I knew they would like him.

We set off for California on the 21st with L, J, and Janine who is also from my home town. We stayed that night at a hotel in attached rooms. The main room had 2 double beds. The attached room had a single queen bed or something like that. Anyways, L and J got the room with the single bed and that left Rob and Janine and me in the main room. I slept in the bed with Janine and Rob slept in the other bed by himself. This was really weird. It made me very glad Janine was with us, or it would have been exceptionally weird. But we had fun. I remember joking around and throwing pillows and stuff.

The next day, the 22nd, I’m pretty sure I forced Rob to sing “Old Man River” for my family, in the car. I was so in love with Rob and loved his voice and wanted everyone else to love it, too. So I was always asking him to sing (as I still always am). Sometime later on the drive Rob and I were talking in the back seat. I told him something I had told a few other people, but never had told Rob. I told him I didn’t like the way he kissed. I don’t recall what it was that I didn’t like about it, but I didn’t like it. So he said he’d work on it.

Rob: She didn’t just tell me. I had to pry it out of her. She was worried about how I would take the criticism. I have to admit it did hurt a little, but I would rather have known something like that than kiss her for the rest of my life and have her not really enjoy it. This may sound weird but I made the matter a matter of prayer. I felt it was important to have my future wife enjoy kissing me so I prayed about how I might make this a more enjoyable experience. The ideas came flooding in.

Later that day, at my parents house now, he kissed me and I fell in love all over again. I remember being blown away that he had been able so quickly to change how he kissed me so that I really liked it. I asked him how he did it and he just said he prayed. Wow. I liked it. All of it: the kissing and the praying.

Thanksgiving went fine. I remember that Rob was in charge of the mashed potatoes and he mixed them until they didn’t have lumps any more, and then found out my dad likes it with lumps in it. And I think I again ate a full pumpkin pie in a day. I do that most Thanksgivings. Rob also had a talk with my dad. It wasn’t to get “permission” from him, because I give the permission, but I did want Rob to talk to him. From what Rob’s told me, it wasn’t much of a talk. Later Dad would tell me that Rob is the best of the best of men. I doubt he had such glowing things to say about me.

Rob: This is the way the conversation went. I asked if he was OK with me marrying his daughter. He responded by asking if it mattered what he thought and whether it would change whether I married his daughter or not. I told him no, that I was going to marry her either way. He then said it didn’t matter then what he thought. He then asked if I realized what I was getting into by marrying Tamra. I later found out I had no idea.

The next day, the 23rd, we had Jane and Phil over. I had invited them over to “grill Rob” about marrying me. It was sort of a quality check. Phil was too soft on him, but he approved whole-heartedly. Jane is a little jaded from her personal experience, so she objected to us getting married. Not because she objected to Rob, but because she objected to anyone getting married young. This annoyed me a little, but I kind of liked that she was razzing Rob, too.

Rob: I only really remember the end of this conversation. I remember telling the both of them that I was sure it would work out. Jane looked at me and told me that I couldn’t really be sure. I responded simply by saying that I knew myself and knew that this marriage would work and that we would be happy. I’m not sure they believed me but I think they were impressed with my confidence and willingness to stand up for myself and our decision. They at least knew I was committed.

It was probably later that night, before bed, that we talked. Rob and I were kissing and I remember we got into a position that I wasn’t comfortable with. I trust Rob to behave himself, but I wasn’t comfortable. I remember asking Rob why we were laying that way. He said he didn’t know. There was something about his answer that reminded me of JH and so made me a little defensive on the spot. He then quickly remedied the situation and I thought he was mad at me. He told me he appreciated that I would tell him what I was comfortable with and not comfortable with. He said that all a woman ever had to do for him to not do something was tell him it made her uncomfortable. I was amazed and impressed that any male could be so controlled and caring.

We also talked that night about one of my main fears in marrying Rob. Rob is gentle and loving, but he is big. What if he ever hit me? I might not survive. I am little and he is big and this is a little scary to me. He told me that he would never hit me and I didn’t need to worry about that. I told him I trusted him, but how could I know for sure? And he used the trump card: prayer. He said, “You get down and pray right now and ask if I will ever hit you.” He talked about how abuse is a gross misuse of the Priesthood and we prayed about it all, though I doubt at this point I was comfortable enough to pray out loud. So either I said a prayer silently or Rob said a prayer for us, but either way, at the end, I just hugged Rob and my fears were quieted. I knew he was a good man and that he’d never abuse me or our future children.

The next day, the 25th, I took Rob to see a little bit of my home town Not that there’s much to see, mind you, but I wanted to show him around and I wanted some time with just him, too. So we went to the parking garage downtown. It has a pretty good view of town. And then I took him to the park at the top of the only hill in town. I ran Cross Country there a lot in High School. The park was closed, so we parked close and walked up the hill. I hate that hill. The hill gives a pretty good view of the town, as well. We made out a little at that park, which is something we’d never done before. I hadn’t ever been tempted to kiss Rob too much, cause I didn’t like how he kissed. Kissing had been like a chore. But now it was nice and it was tempting.

We drove back to Utah on the 26th. Janine was getting a ride back with someone else, so it was just L and J and Rob and me. This made it more tempting, too. L and J did all the driving, so it was just Rob and me in the back to cuddle. Janine wasn’t there, so there was no one else to chaperone. And then it got dark and Rob and I got back to making out. While making out is fun and I liked it, we knew we could quickly get ourselves into trouble if we followed that path. We agreed to not make out any more until we got married. And we stuck to that.

written Spring 2006