Snow Date

If you'd like to be a part of Wednesday's Walk ... just click on the photo above for instructions. You should do it... it's FUN!

"Us" working our mall jobs - 1989

Yup, this is us, back in the day - check out all the hair we had goin' on! It's true, we met at the mall. "Officially". I had SEEN Luke at the party of a friends and thought he was cute, but had no idea who he was. All I knew is that he was wearing sky blue high top converse tennies and he was CUTE! Right before we began dating he started his job next door to mine. I was a sales clerk at Maurices, my part time college job - and he worked at Kinney Shoes - it was his, "oops... I spent all my student loan money the first semester of college so now I need a job-job" Who'd have guessed that less than 2 years later after these pix were taken, he'd be my husband?! The young skater fella in the photo with Luke is my brother, Jarrod. He was just a youngster. :) So it begins... the story of Luke and Jami.

SNOW DATE

Our first date was on February 24, 1989 – 20 years ago! I can’t believe that much time has passed since my husband invited me to go sledding with him and his friend Chad, and Chad’s girlfriend Shelly (who also happened to be a friend of mine). We lived in Norfolk, Nebraska at the time and I was working at Maurices in the Mall selling women’s clothing. I was scheduled to work that day and Luke had come over and insisted that I HAD to go with them. I argued that I was scheduled to work, and being the bad influence he was *wink* he encouraged me to call in sick. Well, I didn’t want to be irresponsible, but I REALLY wanted to go and it was snowing and blustery that day. Knowing Mall business, there wouldn’t be too many people out and about. So I called my boss and she said not to bother coming in because business was dead. WAHOO! I got to go. I was really excited because this would be our first official date. We had been friends for a while and then there was the time that he drove me home and we talked in his car for 2 hours and then I invited him in and he stayed until about 3 a.m. just talking. Maybe we’re all talked out, because we don’t talk nearly as much any more. I guess after 20 years you probably know most everything about a person? Ha ha… but we would go sledding with our friends and life as we know it would never be the same.

We jumped in the back of Chad’s old car, I don’t remember what kind it was but I’m sure Luke does. It was about a 3 hour trip and we held hands on the way. It was sweet… being a college guy, he didn’t seem to be like the rest and I was glad to be in the company of a young man so considerate and sweet. (and CUTE!) We made snow angels, threw snow balls, built snow tunnels and then sledded through them. It was a blast. I knew already then that something was different… I felt like we had known each other forever. I still remember the ugly white, pointy toed, lace up ankle boots I was wearing, the fun we had, how he made me laugh, the way he looked at me and I felt like the only girl on the face of the planet. As a teenager girl I asked my mom so many times how to know if you’re truly in love. She would always say, “You’ll just KNOW”. I hated that answer because it didn’t make sense to me. But for the first time ever… only a short time after returning from our snow date… that answer made sense to me. I realized I couldn’t live my life without Luke Hespe. We knew after only a couple of months that we would spend our life together and we made it official when he proposed to me in July of 1989. (that’s right, only about 5 months after our snow date!) We were married the following April. No regrets. Our marriage has had its ups and downs, but mom was still right – YOU JUST KNOW.

Me and my man... 20 years later