I fell in love with a girl on the World Race. The thing every single racer secretly (or not so secretly) hopes for; it happened to me! One of my amazing teammates is now my girlfriend. All those annoying people at home that asked if I was romantically interested with every racer they saw next to me in a photo were eventually right. They take every opportunity to remind me of it.
Kylie and I have an incredible story, an awesome relationship, and a life together that is just beginning.
We started dating after we got home. We had been teammates for half the race. Through feedback and mistakes and joy and ministry, we got to know each other as friends. The dating interest came later. We got to experience the race together, yet individually. I am eternally grateful for both.
I am discovering that love is not what I thought it would be. And definitely falling in love with a racer was not what I thought it might be. I’ve seen too many movies. I thought love would fall into phrases like, “she makes me want to be a better man.” The truth is, she makes me a better man, whether I like it or not. There are a lot of butterflies and head-in-the-clouds that are strangely missing. I just love her. It is that simple. I’m not swooning or falling out of my chair every day. It just is. Beautifully, it just is. It feels normal, like it has always been there. We’ve been dating long distance (seriously, like 1500 miles) for four months. I thought I’d feel like dying when she is not around. I miss her, but it is not as dramatic as I thought it would be. I think it is like reading page 23 of a 900 page book, wherein your favorite character does not appear on that page. Part of you likes her so much you wish she was in every sentence. But part of you realizes, ok, there are eight hundred seventy seven pages to go (in which I know she’ll be featured), so this one page doesn’t seem so long.
I was thinking about this the other day and I realized one important thing. With all due respect to the relationship I found with Kylie, which I do adore beyond measure, I have already fallen in love. The Love of my life is spoken for. I know it is a cheesy sentiment, but Jesus has already filled the top spot. I fell head over heels in love with Jesus a long time ago. He is the one I absolutely can’t exist without. He is my everything. I don’t really know why I love Kylie, but I suspect it is Jesus’ fault. That saying that says “a woman ought to be so close to the Lord that a man must seek Him to find her,” makes more sense to me now than it ever has.
Kylie and I were not looking for each other on the race. We may have been looking for romance, but I think it is fair to say that we weren’t looking for it in each other. We also were looking for the Lord. We fell in love with Him. Even though I found a girl I plan to be with forever, my race is still much more marked by the time I spent with Jesus. The race will never be “the place I met my wife” primarily. It will be “the year I spent with my beloved.”
I am writing this on my race blog as a warning to racers. Let the dating thing go. Even if you are lucky enough to find it, let it go. God wants to be your Beloved. He wants your race to be about Him. As much as I love Kylie, it is sad to me to think about looking back on the race and considering our relationship as the biggest take-away. I saw the story of God unfolding. I lived the story of God. He is the love of my life. There are probably a lot of cautionary tales from alumni racers about pursuing dating and it not working out in the end and them regretting having spent time focused there. Well, hear it from someone who successfully found a dating relationship: if there is more to loving God than failed relationships, there is also more to loving God than successful ones.
When I played soccer in high school, we did a drill where the coach divided us up into twos. He assigned us a partner. His choice, completely out of our hands. Kylie is my partner and I could not be more happy about it. Our relationship is fun and challenging and productive. But our final goal is not just being partners. Our partnership is a drill, an exercise in serving the greater purpose. In that old soccer drill, some people did not have partners. I kind of relished that because it had its own advantages (you’ll have to trust me because I don’t want to take the time to explain the whole drill). We are called to be content in everything. Kylie and I are partners. It is that simple. Life together. It is the most extraordinary ordinary thing in the world.
I would not trade my partner for anything. Nor would I trade the goal for which we are striving.
