All The Boys - Run Karina Run

Oh, God has the greatest sense of humor. Can you hear Him laughing from where you sit? Because I can. He’s having a jolly old time right about now, laughing at (okay, with) me.

Let me explain.

When I was in high school, I was not athletic. At all. In fact, the last time I did any sort of sports activity was when I ran track in the 4^th grade. Then puberty hit, and I was all set with sweating. I became a girlie girl. Sports were not for me. By the time high school came around, I was one of those girls in gym class who would walk laps around the gym in order to not have to participate in the volleyball game.

And running? Up until about a year ago I used to say that “I’ll run if someone is chasing me”.

I was not a jock.

Recently, as in, within the last year, I've started running. I love it, I'm addicted, but I'm still pretty much a newbie.

You need to know this, because it'll come into play later.

The other thing you need to know, if you are just tuning in is that I don't date much (ahem, at all), and haven't for a really long time. My last date was quite a while ago, and the date before that date? I don't remember.

Initially this not dating thing was a choice, a decision to work on myself, to take some time for me. And then...well, life, and being in my 30's and living in the suburbs, and not really meeting anyone outside my "circle" (and we won't discuss the disaster that dating INSIDE my circle turned into...nope, we won't).

So, yeah, I don't really date. I've wanted to get back out on the dating scene for a while now, but the pickin's? They are slim.

So, anyway, those are the things you need to know.

And now, begins the comedy portion of this post:

In high school, I met this boy. Let's call him Pretty Boy. Pretty Boy was a sweet kid and we had a “thing”. As far as high school things go, this was of the most innocent and secretive kind. He was friends with another boy I had an on again/off again thing with, and he was a little shy, so, we hung out, but it never really amounted to much of anything.

If I remember correctly, and my memories of high school are hazy, mostly because I’ve blocked a lot of that time in my life out of my memory completely, we discovered our mutual attraction far too close to graduation to really pursue it.

I never saw him again after graduation, and to be honest, I don’t think I ever thought of him again. I pretty much forgot he existed, and I’ll venture to say it was a mutual thing.

Then about a year ago, FaceBook suggested him as a friend. Surprised to recognize both his name and his face, I sent him a message asking if he remembered me. It took him so long to reply that I once again forgot he existed. When he did reply, he apologized for the late response, explaining he was never on FB, but said of course he remembered me. I’d like to tell you that at that point a conversation ensued, but…I believe I responded to that message, but never heard from him again.

As he’d said, he’s never really on FB, and, in all honesty, I once again forgot all about him.

Until this week.

Because this week, after I went running one day, and posted a status with my run stats, I heard from him.

He said “Wow, I’m proud of you, that’s a great run time, I can’t do that well just yet”. Something along those lines.

Randomly.

Out of nowhere.

Unexpected.

And, something inside me said “hmmmmm”.

So, without allowing myself time to hesitate, second guess, and chicken out, I replied to his comment, saying we should go running sometime, I’d love to catch up.

I put it out there, and I walked away.

And later that day I had a private message from him saying he’d love to go running, perhaps this weekend, giving me his number to call him.

I wrote him back, saying this weekend was good, telling him I’d call him “later this week”.

Today is later this week.

I just called him.

The conversation was short, because he was at work, but it was comfortable, easy, fun. We caught up a bit, talked about work, and then he asked "So when do you want to go running?"

We decided on Saturday afternoon.

He said he's really looking forward to catching up.

I said "This should be a lot of fun".

He had to get back to work, we hung up.

I’m out of practice with this dating thing.

I'm a little bit nervous.

I'm a lot bit excited.

I’m well aware this could be non-romantic in all aspects, I’m not pinning a whole lot of hopes on this.

I’m also aware that this has potential. I’m a little “teenage girl” giddy.

Also…God is laughing. Because I? Am going RUNNING on a potential date?

Running?

With a guy.

A guy I haven’t seen in 17 years.

Running.

Yep, God has a wicked sense of humor.

Thank God for that.