The Beginning Through Airaka's Eyes

The Beginning Through Airaka's Eyes


by Airaka Nichole Espinoza Price


It is late February of 1999, the snow is just beginning to melt and with that comes the blossoms on the trees that start new life. Spring is the time of year my mother would say when people were “twitter pated”. We are almost into the third month of the year and I have only been on one date thus far. I am discouraged being nineteen years old, almost twenty and completely ready to be married. I am ready to be someone's wife and take on the noble calling of a mother. I am angry and upset that I seem to have no prospects. “What's wrong with me?” I cry out to no one.

It's Sunday and the day is almost over. It's getting darker and I can see the moon through my basement window. I live at home with my parents still. In a makeshift apartment in the basement that was once used by my grandparents. I kneel down beside my bed and start to pray. I thank my Heavenly Father for my blessings and then as I sit there in quietness and ponder I say to him.

“Heavenly Father, thou knowest whats in my heart. Thou knowest what is best for me. I am ready when you are.” I get up from my knees feeling like a burden has been lifted. I climb the stairs up to the family room upstairs to meet the aroma of dinner cooking.
Monday comes and goes, Tuesday as well. Wednesday I am sitting at the new family computer that my Dad had bought for Christmas. It's the first time my family has connected to the world wide web. I am gleefully enjoying my experience meeting people online from around the world in chat rooms. I am in a chat room talking to a man from Layton, Utah. He seems so much older than I am as he is twenty-seven so I'm not too interested. I've decided not to date anyone. I soon receive an instant message from someone I don't recall ever speaking to. He starts to ask me questions about my self. “What do you look like? Tell me about your self? If I give you my number will you call me?”
I am amazed that this person thinks to ask such things. My replies are honest and true, I tell him exactly what I look like not sugar coating it but being truthfully honest. I tell him I love to sing and I ask if he is a Mormon. He replies, “Yes”, and that he is an R.M. I am confused at what an R.M. is I say, “What is that?”

“A returned missionary! Are you sure your Mormon?”

I am embarrassed so I quickly say, “I am just not familiar with the term.”

“If I give you my number will you call me?”

I'm sacred and tell my Mom, who is in the kitchen. Being the ever loving, happy woman she is she tries to encourage me and tells me to, “Do it!” in an excited tone of a teenage girlfriend. I tell him sure why not. I figure its safe I call him he doesn't have my number. I forget about a little new invention called caller ID. I wait a few hours then call this man who calls him self, Rick. Our conversation goes like this. “Hi this is the girl you met on the Internet.”

“WOW, that was really brave of you to call.”
I giggle nervously as we begin to talk the usual conversation when you first meet someone. He then asks me to sing for him and for strange reason I do. I am not nearly as nervous as I usually am when singing in front of family. There is a comfort there. We talk more and time passes by the end of our call it would be in the six o'clock hour of a new day.
He tells me everything from his past. He talks to me about his illness as a teenager and shares some of his feelings from his experiences during that time. I am shocked by all that has happened to him, but have a feeling of wanting to protect him and hold him. A man that I have not even seen yet. There is a deep connection. As we share our lives with each other over the telephone. He then asks me out for Friday night. I start to step backwards as I say, “You don't even know what I look like.”

He then responds with words of wisdom to that pierce my soul, “We have connected spiritually, Mentally and now all that is left is physically and I am not worried about it.”

I agree to the date for Friday evening. Rick is more than I could have ever hoped for. He is a clean cut good looking man who happens to be twenty-eight. He is calm and he is a gentleman. On our way out the door he takes my hand as we walk to the car where he opens the door up for me. In the car he holds my hand. I am nervous and worried, but I need not be. By the end of the date when he drops me at home. I think to myself in a sarcastic tone that went well. He won't call back, he is just one more face that will forever be in my memories of a first date.
I go in to the house and head down to my room. I heat up leftovers from dinner as I hadn't eaten yet. I turn on my television set and settle on a romantic comedy one of my favorites. The phone rings. Startled, I run to answer it. Worried that it will wake the house up.

“Hello.” I say in quiet tones.
An enthusiastic, “Hi”, is on the other end. It's Rick.

“What are you doing?” I ask him in bewildered wonderment.

“I am calling you back.”

I am confused as I don't remember calling him. “I didn't call you.”

On the other end I hear a sigh and then the word, “NO”, then the tone softens and I he continues. “You said no one ever calls you back. I'm calling you back!” I realize in that moment he is referring to our past conversation. I had explained to him that no one ever called me back for a second date. He is proving me wrong. My heart melts, as I know this man is different from all the rest and in my eyes he's turned out to be something better.
This is just the start of our whirlwind romance. It starts out so fast I get lost in the moments. He comes see me every day of our courtship, we are engaged on May 6th, 1999 a Thursday. Time becomes a dream and on September 1st, 1999, we become husband and wife for time and all eternity. We our sealed in the Salt Lake Temple for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Ours is a fairytale wedding, I am the princess and he is my prince.