"A Deeper Shade of Blue - My Soul Mate" (2/4)

I should clarify something at this point. These feelings and thoughts about Jeana were not 24/7. It was not an obsession. They generally resided in the back of my mind. I went about my life in a relatively normal fashion and built my relationship with my girlfriend as one would. But on occasion, I would be struck with these thoughts about that pretty, blonde haired girl.

I graduated from high school in June of 1977. Jan and I were still together. We had been an item for nearly two years at that point and people were beginning to get the idea that we would eventually get married. I suppose that was a reasonable assumption. I was starting to think the same thing.

Baptist Community Bible Church was the hub of my activities and social life. We had a very active youth group that had a Sunday School class on Sunday mornings, youth choir and youth group meetings on Sunday nights, a Wednesday night church service, Thursday night volleyball and then other regular activities most weeks. If you haven’t picked up on it already, I will tell you that our youth group was a very close and cohesive group of teens. We felt like family and many of our lives were extremely intertwined with each other.

Because of that, we all felt a sense of loss when Jeana let us know that her family was moving from Lakewood to Ontario during the summer of 1977 and that she would be leaving the church. Ontario was about 45 minutes, depending on the traffic, inland from the LA area and was known for its dairy farms. But in the 1970’s, most of those dairy farms began disappearing and were replaced with housing tracts. The Ontario/Chino area became the low-cost alternative to living in the suburbs of Los Angeles.

Jeana was a bright light in our group. She was a spark plug. She was the spice in the recipe. She brought life to our gatherings. If you know her now, then you know she still has that gift and presence still today.

And on a personal level, her move brought me some sadness. I hated to see her go. I remember throwing her a “going away party.” I don’t know if she ever knew that the party was 100% my idea and orchestration.

In the fall of 1977, I was off to Bible College to study for the ministry. I wanted to eventually serve as a youth pastor or a youth evangelist. Jan enrolled with me and we both moved onto the campus of Pacific Coast Baptist Bible College in San Dimas, California.

For Christmas that year, I bought Jan a “promise ring.” Is that even a thing anymore? It basically meant that “I want to eventually marry you but I’m either too young or too cheap (or both) to buy you an engagement ring.”

In early 1978, I left Baptist Community Bible Church in Norwalk and began attending Mid-Cities Baptist Temple in Downey, where my brother, Bill, had recently taken over as pastor. This was his first pastorate and he wanted me to come work with the teens of his church. Jan made the switch also. I immediately began working with the teens and absolutely fell in love with ministering to this group.

Jeana arriving at Tracy's apartment

I kept in contact with several my friends from my old church. One of the things I found out was that Jeana had returned to the church. Apparently she missed it so much that her parents agreed to drive her the 45 minutes from Ontario every Friday night and she would spend the weekend with her friend, Tracy Moore, before going back home after church on Sunday nights. Good for her and good for them. I was happy to hear about this.

During my second semester of college, I began to really question my love and affection for Jan. 2-1/2 years together and our relationship, for me, had become more of a comfortable habit than passionate love story. I remember meeting several young ladies in college that I would have loved to ask out… but, of course, I couldn’t as long as I was in this committed relationship. I really should have ended things with Jan at that point but I didn’t.

I started my second year of college in the fall of 1978. Jan, as planned, didn’t return to college for a second year, choosing instead to work. I was intrigued by the idea of being at school without my girlfriend next to me. I was committed to being faithful to her but I anticipated the temptations to grow stronger.

Christmas 1978 stands out in my mind because I heard some news about Jeana. Apparently she had received a very special gift… an engagement ring. The pastor’s son at my old church (who happened to be my brother Bill’s, brother-in-law) had popped the question.

I remember feeling like someone had just punched me in the gut. I was not happy about this news but it wasn’t anything that I could discuss with anyone. I just felt a profound sadness. I guess there really was a hope in the inner recesses of my mind that we would somehow, miraculously end up together. That was how the fairytale was supposed to play out but her engagement had torn up that script.

Jeana’s engagement stirred such a strong response in me that I began to seriously contemplate a breakup with Jan. It was not fair that her boyfriend of 3+ years was secretly harboring these strong feelings about another girl… even though the other girl was now clearly out of the picture.

At that point, I did my best to forget about Jeana and the little fantasy that I had carried around for the last couple years. Time to purge these pesky little thoughts from my brain. Time to move on.

Tim Knauf had been my best friend from day one in college. We met the day that we moved into the dorm together in the fall of 1977. He was a Northern California boy and the son of a preacher. It was pretty clear that attending Bible College was not his idea but he was there only to satisfy mom and dad. His commitment was to stay for one semester and one semester only! I made it my goal to change his mind about that.

Tim was tall, had jet black hair and was a very good looking guy (is it okay for me to say that?). He also was very picky when it came to girls. He rarely if ever dated. And all of this presented a big problem for me. I had beautiful coeds, constantly wanting to talk to me. What’s the problem with that? They wanted to talk to me… about Tim!

2016 

They all wanted Tim to “notice” them. They all wanted Tim to ask them out. But no matter how hard they tried, Tim seemed oblivious. I was assigned the task of breaking through Tim’s barrier and convincing him to ask one of them out. I failed miserably. Dating was not Tim’s focus. Besides, why start something when he had no plans of coming back after the first semester.

One of the girls who sought my match making services was named Debi. I went to bat for her with Tim but like all the others, Tim simply wasn’t interested. Despite that, Debi kept coming back to talk and it wasn’t long before the conversation turned from Tim… to her and me.

Debi and I had developed an interest in each other that needed to be explored but there was one problem. I had a girl at home that had invested three and a half years into our relationship with the promise of marriage in the not too distant future.

I told Debi that I wanted to ask her out but that I wouldn’t do it until I took care of a little business first.

I was going to break up with Jan.

To be continued…