After last week's episode on grief — I wanted to bring you something that has been one of my greatest sources of healing throughout my entire life.
Love.
Specifically — my thirty year love story with Johnny.
If we had been adults when we met — we would have been that crazy couple that got married within weeks. That is how fast it happened. That is how certain it felt.
We were fifteen and eighteen years old and we had absolutely no business feeling that sure about anything. But there it was. And thirty years later — here we still are.
I met Johnny at cross country practice a couple of weeks before the start of my freshman year. He was a senior. One of the top runners on the team.
I noticed him immediately. Not just because of his face — although that certainly didn't hurt. But because of the way he carried himself. The way he worked. The way he treated everyone around him. There was something about him that was just — good. Genuinely, quietly, consistently good.
So I did what any fifteen year old girl with absolutely no patience would do. I told a friend. Who told him. That I thought he was cute. And that if he thought I was cute — he should call me.
He called that same day.
We talked for hours. And we never really stopped.
Within a month we knew we loved each other unlike anything we had ever felt. And honestly — that scared us. We were way too young to feel that much.
And I got spooked. That winter I broke up with him. And spent the next four or five months being absolutely miserable without him.
So I did what I do. I wrote him a letter. It was 1996. I told him how much I regretted it. How much I missed him. How much I wanted to try again.
He called. And we got back together stronger than we had been before. Because now we knew what it felt like without each other. And we didn't want to feel that again.
There were hard roads ahead. He was a first generation college student — his parents had left Mexico to build a life in Colorado and give him opportunities they never had. And I was still in high school with a job and a boyfriend thirty minutes away living a completely different life.
And then we found out we were pregnant. We were teenagers. And the world got very complicated very fast.
Johnny never missed a single appointment. Not one ultrasound. Not one Lamaze class. A college athlete with a full course load — and he showed up for every single one.
That is who he is. That has always been who he is.
The early years were not easy. We were young and passionate and volatile in the way that young love can be. We fought. We wondered more than once if we were going to make it.
We always tell other couples — marriage is peaks and valleys. You will have seasons of closeness and seasons of distance. And the couples who make it are not the ones who never hit the valleys. They are the ones who weather the storm together. Every single time.
The turning point for us was California. Moving away from everything familiar and having to become each other's person completely. No safety net. No family around the corner. Just us. And our daughter. And the life we were building from scratch.
That season was hard. But it was also where we truly became a team.
I want to tell you about who Johnny is today.
He is my favorite person in this world. My favorite person to travel with — to explore new places, try new things, see the world alongside. He is driven and talented and one of the smartest people I know. He can be a grouch — we tease him about it regularly — but underneath the grouch is one of the most devoted, loving, quietly extraordinary people I have ever known.
Recently when I started a new job and was feeling the weight of trying to do everything at once — he pulled me aside and reminded me. You don't have to do it all alone. We are a team.
Thirty years in — still paying attention. Still showing up. Still reminding me of what I sometimes forget about myself.
I thought I fell more in love with him watching him become a father.
And I did.
But then I watched him with his aging parents. And I fell in love with him all over again. The patience. The devotion. The way he loves the people who sacrificed everything to give him a chance at this life.
That is not something you can fake. That is character. That is the man I chose at fifteen. And the man I would choose again every single day.
What thirty years has taught me about love is this.
The version of love we are sold when we are young — the butterflies, the certainty, the feeling of knowing — is only the very beginning of what love actually is.
Real love is a practice. It is the choice you make on the days when the feeling is quiet. When you are tired and stressed and not your best self — and you choose kindness anyway.
Not the butterflies.
The staying.
That is what makes a love story last.
A few questions to sit with:
- Is there a season in your relationship that tested you — and what did you learn about each other on the other side of it?
- Is there something your partner does — quietly, consistently — that you haven't told them you notice and are grateful for?
- How has your understanding of love changed from when you first felt it to where you are now?
- If you are not currently in a partnership — what does love look like for you in this season? What would you want it to look like?
If this episode resonated with you I'd love to hear from you at faith@stillbuildingpodcast.com — I read every message.
You're not alone. You're not behind. You're not finished.
You're still building.
— Faith