The Beautiful Dress, I borrowed

My nine-year-old daughter and I lived in our apartment for almost two years before I met my future husband. I wanted to meet someone. It was four years since the great sorrow of my husband and my mother’s death.  I was ready now, in the way that I was feeling whole again. (More together than before.)  And it was through God that I managed  life on my own and survived.  I felt sure I could add to someone’s life now, from where I was coming from. I could feel the difference of the change in me that wasn’t needy as, looking for someone to save me.  I felt stronger through my faith in God.  I was ready to move in the right direction and open up to new possibilities.  

           One day a neighbor called me at work. She asked me, “Would you like to go to a party with my brother tonight?” His date had to cancel at the last minute, and the seating arrangements were already made. I said, “Yes!”  I couldn’t hold back my excitement while at work. The entire hair salon – the hairstylist, receptionist, and even the clients – were just as excited as I was.  Everyone knew the longing I had of meeting someone new!

            It was a formal affair, and I didn’t have the proper dress for the occasion.  I called my sister-in-law who lived just around the corner from me and explained about the sudden blind date.  She invited me over to her house to pick out any of her formal dresses to wear on this special date. The dress I chose was a beautiful long-length cream-colored soft crepe gown, with a deep plunge neck line that softly overlapped from one shoulder to the other, making it very feminine, but not too revealing.   It looked something like the dresses that the women of royalty wore in the Roman days. My sister-in-law was just as excited for me and made me feel like Cinderella going to a ball.  I truly felt so honored that she showed so much love and joy in watching me get ready for this special occasion. I will never forget the feelings of butterflies in my stomach even more so from her excitement.  She is one of those angels sent from God, which I am forever grateful for. She may have been the same years closer to my age, but with wisdom from the heart.  She responded in the same delight that echoed a mother’s love that would have shown to her own daughter...  And what was truly needed here. 

          My date took me to his friend’s fiftieth birthday party.  He was an airplane pilot and a flight instructor, and the party was for one of his students that he taught how to fly.  I was so impressed with him and his ability to fly airplanes.  Not only that, he was very handsome and professional looking and, he wore a suit! I remembered my mother telling me shortly after my first husband died that I was so young and would meet someone again; she saw me with a man wearing a suit one day!  (I was still trusting in her wisdom and guidance to lead me.) We talked and danced all night. The beautiful reception room, the dinner, the wine, the music, the suit, and the beautiful dress I borrowed, were perfectly in line for the man and the woman that fell in love that night.  I would get very excited every time I was in his company.  We dated a little over a year before we decided to set a wedding date.  

              He would often laugh and tell me his first impression he had of me when we first met: He told me he thought he met a rich widow. He said, “You were living as though you were rich, by the way you took care of your family as though you were wealthy.”  And he said, "I'll never forget how lovely you looked in the most beautiful dress that you wore that night!” (He didn’t know it was borrowed.) We sometimes laugh at this today. I did feel rich as all the scriptures and words in prosperity were etched in my heart from my daily prayers. And the gratitude I felt towards those who have lifted me along the way.  I was not as rich material wise as many others would consider rich at that time; but I was rich in thought, which I found is the greatest wealth of all.  I was happy and wanted to lift others and share the love, joy, and the wealth that was in me.

               It is apparent to me now that the place I was feeling within brought me to the love and the abundant life from my trust and faith in God.  And that life can be a true-life fairy tale, when we hold on to our faith and keep looking up!

Continued...

Excerpt from: Imprinted Wisdom 

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