Chapter 13: The Love of My Life...................by Julianna Rowe

 This chapter could have been named Crestview II as the true story carried the same demons held inside the souls of each character including myself.  Those silent dragons kept me on a continual search for Crestview’s delusive dreams. 

Chapter 13:  The Love of My Life…..Really Wasn’t 

     (I remember the day he walked into the hotel restaurant where I and a friend were having lunch.  He caught my Crestview eye and I watched intently as he sauntered across the room.  He was a cross between Sam Elliot and Rhett Butler! He had removed his black Stetson hat upon entering and held it close to his hip as he moved. His shirt was crisp as was the sharp crease down the center of his denim jeans.  His dark leather western boots led not only his walk but called out to me with a howling I instantly yearned for from his touch.  And then he seated himself in the rich black leather booth, looked up, and our eyes locked.  That was the beginning of a true but treacherous and sad love story.)   

            I believe my mind had metal plates surrounding it not allowing any good sense of any kind to enter because I carried a deep love for that man from the age of twenty seven until four years ago. I “bore” that love through two marriages. Not that I didn't love my "hubbs" plural! I have heard we all have the "first love" or "soul mate" love in our lives. Personally I have come to learn we can love more than one person but in different ways. I could go into a long love story here that lasted "three years to life" (some call that a sentence)......add all the ups and believe me the downs....add the children hurt.....the flights back and forth from Oklahoma to Virginia every week.....the heart pounding races to the airport with what seemed like movie star red carpet encounters at the entrance gates bounding into the warm passionate arms of one another then building further to gentle yet firm kisses for all to view. Never knowing anyone else was in the building. Carrying luggage, sharing meals, drinks, loving tenderly....dancing closely, laughing uncontrollably, and best of all looking into one an others eye's seeing the reflection of only one of two. We shared a deep love indeed. 

           I have heard that money is the root of all evil. Pain and grief could be included in that circle of adjectives regarding evil.  

           The world says true and honest Love is all good and pure. So there you have my story, all "tied up” with a handsome cowboy who sauntered into a restaurant and looked into my eyes. Not all true and honest love lasts.

            Basically my story could be two sentences or even two words. Love or Money. Question mark. He chose the money and I was left with the grief and pain which I shall explain.

            I thought I should die. Long story again.... humm maybe someday I shall have more time to write….. for believe me this would be a great book about the tall dark and handsome cowboy, and I shall add, upperclass cowboy whose Daddy rich britches gave him a choice, me or the millions of inheritance.  You see my love was in the midst of a divorce and the soon to be x-wife being wiser and rich put private detectives on him.  She had photos of the wholesome airport greetings, the sharing meals, the luggage being carried into my home.  Photo’s she showed Daddy rich britches.  I broke up no marriage.  The papers had been filed long before I came into any view. Her plan worked out well for her where as the photos helped her attain much of the family fortune.

          The saddest of all was my parents liked him. The children were allowed to go places with us.  The doors were opening for me to see my boys again.  And then once again the doors closed for my boys and I.

          He had purchased me a brand new 1974 burgundy and white Grand Prix.  Asked me to marry him...... until his "Daddy" stopped the gentle deep love, the travel, the red carpet meetings, and the marriage, the everything, in our tracks. 

         I was still working for Arthur at the real estate offices when I learned these facts in a motel outside a dusty small town in western Virginia, where he visited me one last time and was instructed to give me the family decision.  We sat on the edge of an old motel bed and sobbed together like two children. Cowboy’s Daddy chose new tracks for my / our life, and I felt like a homeless bum left in a box car on deserted tracks, alone to die. A lost Love can make a person feel like that. Yet as the years past he was always that little box of a dream I could go to when I needed. A fake hope.  My foolish faith was a photo in the second drawer of my jewel box and a chapter in my life book page 266. He was not my God but he was one of my earthly treasures I always hoped to meet again whether at age eighty on earth or in the heavens hereafter.

         Over the years we spoke by phone a few times, even met once. Oddly, the man I did marry lived in a small town in Texas where my Rhett Butler/Sam Elliot built and opened a Meat packing business one mile away from our home. Odd? I would say!! He had moved from his lifelong home in Virginia to this small city in East Texas, one mile from me. And I moved from Virginia with my husband to one mile from him.

           By then he had more children and so had I. The next time we spoke he had 14 Grandchildren and I had 6..... I knew then heaven was about the only place we might ever be together again. Yes I am laughing because the Universe was either trying to kill the demons of Crestview or trying to keep them alive.

            On occasion during a boring evening at home I would Google his name. Yes I did! And finally one night I found pictures of he and his family...all six children, the Grands, his still living Mother.....and Jackpot, I found one of his daughters on a Face Book site with his photo included. He was bald and I barely recognized him yet he still held that handsome Rhett Butler appearance of taking care of one’s self. The tailored suit and perfect boots. Looking at his photo I could still feel the warmth and safety of his arms and the softness of his lips on mine...my dreams smashed, my hopes lost, my years of deep wanting and memories crushed like a mile wide tornado came onto my screen and into the furrows of my mind and left me momentarily empty. Crap, now that's twice I am left empty by this fellow. My fault...I could have kept my delusional dreams and fake security forever if I hadn't hit that keyboard or joined face book. Now I don't even have a fake memory of a deep love!

              The Crestview money/demons won out again in the end.... for they were mightier than my fragile earthy dreams!  The moral of this love story is that it really wasn't.   By the way he always took excellent care of himself in every manner as I said.  I noticed in the facebook photos his wife was Really Really LARGE!  I’m sorry Rhett, that’s what you get.  

            I read he passed away a few years ago.  I thought I might get a sign from him from the beyond but I never did.  He was a piece of Crestview from the generations past that needed to be lived and allowed to die. I think.