Big dreams...

After Christmas break was over and we had to make our way back to school, (yuck) things were different. We were seniors. The end of an era. The class of 1992. Wow, I had made it! Well,....we had made it.
    The buzz was prom, graduation and what  we were gonna do after graduation? Go to college, get married, have kids get a job? That's what the future was all about right? And in that order, right?
  I had never really thought of going to college. It wasn't something that was forced upon me throughout high school. I just thought I would be like my mom and marry someone like my dad. He provided and she stayed home. I didn't know anything other then that. It was easy, right? But when I was a junior, I had my appendix removed. It was during  winter 1991. I was in the hospital for a week. I was so impressed by all the nurse,s the needles, the blood and gross stuff and thought this is what I want to be when I grow up.
Yep, so I had my sights set on this as a job. I researched it as much as I could back then without having the luxury of the Internet. I was set. I was going to college. Just didn't know where yet?
  In my yearbook along side my senior picture I wrote my goal "become a nurse and marry Bob." Yep, it's there in black and white for everyone to see. Big dreams!
 Well, in April 1992 as I was trying to figure out what I was going to wear to prom, something strange was happening. Something, very strange. I had missed a period. "Ummmmmm!" Back in February sometime, Bob and I had committed the ultimate no no...we had sex. Protected....unprotected?? Not so sure exactly. But given the fact that I was pregnant would probably mean ...ahhhh...."unprotected!!"
   My mother knew every. single. time. I had a period. Faithfully she would check me off on the calendar that she kept posted for the world to see in the kitchen. So when it came "my time of the month" and I was late, she questioned me. "Ange, shouldn't you have started your period by now?" I would say, " no I don't think so, maybe I'm stresses about graduation and prom." Ya that's it!
  Well, she had noticed more then just a "missed"  "X" on the calendar, she had noticed that I was coming home from school and eating 3 peanut butter and jelly sandwiches and a huge glass of chocolate milk. This was something I hadn't done before.
When I suspected that I was pregnant, I had a friend bring a pregnancy test to school for me. I couldn't bring it myself, where was I going to get the money to pay for it? I certainly couldn't ask my mom for cash to buy tampons, knowing that I wasn't really going to be using them. (even though she didn't know I wouldn't be) My Friend just happen to have one at her house. Really?
So when she gave it to me, I ran to the nurses office with it in my purse, took the test in the bathroom and waited for the line to ....not appear! Tick-toc, tick-toc....3 minutes and the line was pink, I was pregnant.
I was alone. In the bathroom. At school. .Afraid. Scared. Yep, all wrapped up in one pretty little pregnancy box that laid on the floor. I looked at the box again, read the directions, hoping it was wrong. It wasn't. I was pregnant. A senior in high school about to graduate, go to prom....! *Hult!* PROM!!! How in the world was I going to fit in a dress for prom?

As I came out of the bathroom, the nurse was there waiting for me. She saw that I had been crying and hugged me. She gave me some information about pregnancy and how to talk to your parents. O. MY. GOD.! I have to talk to my parents? And she said, your going to need a note for gym class. 'O heck ya, no gym for me!" That was the best news I had heard in the last 15 minutes.
Well, it was official, I was pregnant. And by the end of the day, everyone else knew too. Or so I thought.
  I don't remember how long it was before I told my parents. But I eventually did. I had to "grow up" and face what my mom had feared. "I knew it," she said, as tears rolled down her face! I had let her down. I had let my dad down. I hadn't yet told Bob. What was he going to think?
So after the initial schock wore off, I faced up to tell Bob. I was going to wait for him outside by the gym where he parks that hideous jeep of his. When he pulled up I said, "I have something to tell you." He didn't seem to be in a very good mood that morning, but I continued. "Hey, umm, I'm pregnant!"  "Silence." And he walked into the school. I stood there like a dear in headlights. "Stunned!" How could he just walk away and not say a word? (red flag)
I don't know why he felt that he couldn't talk to his parents like I did. I faced the music, put on my big girl panties and worked through it with my parents. So why on earth he decided to take the easy way out, the "pussy" way out and write his mom a letter and leave it in her car for her to find the next day. (red flag)
That wasn't exactly how he should've done it, but he did. It was out there. Both parents knew.
My mom decided that she was going to have his parents over for a little "pow-wow." I think she made some cookies, muffins and coffee. The meeting didn't go so well. We had decided that neither one of us was going to prom. Ok, I was fine with that. The plan was this, we were to be married. "Ummmm, ok do I have a say in this?" His parents were not exactly keen on the idea and they laid down ground rules. "No one from his family was to be invited to the wedding." What are you serious? That's horrible. Yes, ok, we did a "not so good thing here" but lets move on and make the best of it. Family is important, to me anyway. I guess not for them. They didn't even want his grandma to come. Now that's sad! How could they be so cold? (another red flag)
  So the wedding was planned for June 13, 1992. Two weeks after we would graduate with our class we would be Mr. and Mrs.
I was going from a senior, to a bride to a mom all in one year.
I closed one chapter in my life in May of 1992 as I received my diploma with my class. And I was about in embark on a brand new chapter of my life.
     A wife.