#NerdsUnite: Around the world with @HeatherReusz
<editorsnote> Nerds, meet my buddy Heather. She's a nerd who is currently living in Japan by way of Chicago. Yep, talk about a culture shock. She's here today to talk about her life, love (which she is currently balancing long distance) and all things nerd. I only have one more thing left to say ... HIT IT HEATHER!!! </editorsnote>
#TalkNerdyToMeLover's @HeatherReusz
With my boyfriend coming to visit in two weeks, I’ve been thinking about him and us a lot. My boyfriend and I have quite an interesting and unique story. My friends make fun of me saying that it’s like something out of a Nicholas Spark’s novel which I hate. See, I’m not the mushy romantic type of girl. I hate romantic movies, books, and dates. I always feel like most “romantic” dates are a bit forced. My idea of a perfectly romantic date doesn’t need flowers, candy, and candles. All it needs is sincerity from my boyfriend. Doing something as simple as cooking dinner together and playing video games afterwards can be a wonderfully romantic date in my view. Point being, I don’t really buy into traditional romance so it’s pretty ironic that Luke and I have such a dramatic and romantic tale.
Luke and I have known each other for almost 18 years. We first met when I was about 7 and he was 5. Our mothers were very good friends and he was part of this close knit group of families that we had for years. The main thing bonding the families was the boys. One of my little brothers and Luke are best friends. Now before you start judging me, he’s only a year and half younger than I am. Our families did a lot of things together growing up. Luke and I grew close over the years due to our shared interest in nerdy things like video games and comic books. I would be lying if I didn’t admit that by middle school I had a crush on him. It was also pretty obvious that he liked me too. In fact, on our first date he told me that I was one of the first crushes he ever had. But at that time, neither of us were allowed to date so we just kind of always hung around at family gatherings flirting and strengthening our bond.
Once I got to high school things changed a bit. I made new friends as did he. Our families had slowly drifted apart over the years and we were rarely seeing each other. Also with me being a couple of years older than him, I was starting high school as he was finishing middle school. This, of course, by any 14 year olds logic made it a bit kame for me to hang with him. Even though we both still felt connected, we were drifting and really losing that spark.
It didn’t come as a surprise then that when we were deemed “old enough to date” by our mothers, we didn’t date each other. I was a sophomore in high school and had a senior ask me out so I wasn’t going to give that up for a freshman. Ah, high school drama and priorities, how I don’t miss you. The senior ended up being my first love and we dated for over a year and half. By the time I had finally gotten over that heartbreak and relationship, Luke had already moved onto a new girl who he also dated for a while. We played this kind of back and forth game for a couple of years where every time one of us was available the other wasn’t.
We remained friends through this time even though our families didn’t really see each other. We were nowhere near as close as we used to be but still felt a special connection and wanted to stay in touch with each other. We had a couple of activities together, anime club and youth ministry, and still got to see each other at least twice a week. That all changed though once he started dating another girl who was a mutual friend. She was a youth ministry friend so we all saw each other every weekend. After a couple months of dating Luke she decided that she didn’t like that way that we interacted. She felt threatened by me for good reason I guess. She, let’s call her Julie, “asked” that he stop hanging out with me and talking with me so much. He, being a high schooler in love, followed these instructions.
There was a time then for almost two years where we barely talked. He did his thing with her and I had my own relationship going on. The tide totally changed when Julie moved away to a foreign country. Before she left, they had agreed that they could date other people and have new relationships. She moved on pretty quickly and ended up falling in love and living with a new boyfriend. Luke was heartbroken and took this as a sign that he and Julie were finished. I had also recently gotten out of a relationship. So for the first time in nearly 15 years of knowing each other, we were available at the same time.
We reconnected when he came over to my house one summer night to see my brother. I shared my recent heartbreak and we just talked outside for hours. We re-exchanged numbers and started hanging out more and more. We slowly transitioned into dating. It all felt so natural and wonderful. We were happy and having a blast. We had only been dating for a couple of months though when Julie made it clear that she wanted to return to the states. A part of her was expecting Luke to be there waiting. She was enraged when it was pretty evident that he wasn’t going to dump me when she came home. We both knew she was a bit of drama queen and buckled down for a crazy ride. She started trying to turn our friends against us telling them about how terrible of a person I was for breaking her away from her soul mate. She spread around lies and tall tales about both of us. Trying at every turn to break us apart. Luckily most of my friends just kind of brushed it off. It brought us closer together though, laughing at the drama. We were already falling for each other hard.
We’ve been together now for almost three and a half years. We’ve had our ups and our downs but we are still going strong. I am forever grateful to him for sticking to this relationship even when I moved half way across the world. It’s been tough but it’s also been a growing experience for us both. This is a time in our lives when we really needed to pause and decide if we wanted to keep going together and start getting serious or search around for something else while having some fun. I think being away from each other has helped us clearly evaluate our relationship. Fortunately, we’ve both decided through this experience that we really love and care for each other deeply. I can’t wait until he gets here.