Part 3: The Evolution

March 2005

In mid-March, several things happened that paved the way for a potential relationship:

1--Jon's relationship with girl-in-the-ward sputtered out and died
2--Immense amounts of drama (which I loathe) made me drop all contact with boy-at-another-school
3--Jon & I ended up spending huge chunks of time together, despite making no effort to actually spend time together (if that makes any sense)

It's hard to believe that when a guy & girl spend as much time together as Jon & I did that there really was no crushing going on. At one point I distinctly remember thinking, "Could I ever date Jon Blood?" But I quickly smothered the thought because it was Jon Blood! He was the apartment boyfriend! And I certainly didn't want to interfere with my friend who was crushing on him--no more drama for me, thank you very much.

In re-reading my journal during this time, I have little snippets of the things we did together:
*eating dinner at his apartment
*watching him dance at a ward party and being surprised that he could
*being on his team in Trivial Pursuit--we (plus Chris & Lynda) dominated the game
*passing a deflated balloon back & forth for a week or so (no idea why this was so funny at the time)
*watching March Madness with him & Lynda at Carter's apartment
*taking a personality test with him (we had the exact same results--it just took him a good two hours to take the stupid test)
*playing Frisbee at the park
*going to Guitars Unplugged with him & Jamie

At one point I wrote the following sentence in my journal: "hung out w/Jon Blood for 7 HOURS straight! Funny kid."

Sunday, March 20, 2005 (thank heaven for journals--no way I would remember dates otherwise)

A perfectly normal day. I sat next to Jon during a ward musical fireside (which he slept through). He came over to our apartment that evening to make a card for Lynda, who was sick. If I remember correctly, the card said something about "the sun shining on [her] beautiful Mexican face"...

Since he was over, I dragged him with me to deliver cookies to my friend Christine who had hurt her back at work. I introduced him to her like you would any friend, dropped off the cookies, and headed back to my apartment.

It was on the one-block walk back to the apartment that I developed a crush on Jon Blood. It was the strangest experience--one minute everything was normal, and then suddenly, BAM! I had a crush on him.

Of course, this made things awkward. I have a terrible poker face--if I like a boy, it's pretty obvious. Jon's a smart kid, so it didn't take him long to realize what was going on (not that it was difficult to decipher--I don't think it was possible for me to sit any closer to him during the game of Nertz/Pounce that night).

Suddenly I found myself in that terrible "does he like me?" phase. It seemed pretty obvious that the feeling was mutual--he'd wait for me at church, he'd sit next to me on the couch, etc. One night he finally got up the nerve to put his arm around my shoulders--that was when I knew for sure that he liked me, too.

Unfortunately, that was as far as it went for a week or so. He'd come over, cuddle with me on the couch while everyone sat around chatting, and then go home. One day he asked me what I was doing the next night. When I replied, "Nothing", he said, "Good." I was thrilled--he was finally going to ask me out! I waited, and waited, and waited...but no.

At this point I was getting annoyed. Did he think I was one of those girls who'll snuggle with any boy, just to have someone to snuggle with? Not me. I wanted a commitment (or at least an official date).

After venting to my roommates for a few days, I finally decided that I was going to pin him down--if he wanted to keep cuddling, he'd have to ask me out. We planned a movie night for FHE on Monday just so I could invite Jon over and then force him to ask me out.

(Sorry, no pictures! More to come.)

PART FOUR