When I was 15, Dad decided he wanted to move to Cairns. 

The fact that my little brother Matty lived with mum meant that when we moved, there’d be 1700 of distance between the little guy and I. 

I think I still resent dad a little for that. Not so much that I couldn’t be there for him, but that he was able to move so far away from his own son.

But thats not the point. When we got there I didn’t know anyone. My mates at home had thrown me a going away picnic in a beautiful park in the city. I didn’t want to leave them for a small touristy town up the north coast. By the time the new year started at school I was sixteen and insecurity laden. To be honest I was (and still am a bit of) a pretty messed up little girl.

So when a guy by the name of John started to pay attention to me I had no idea why. I reasoned that he was crazy. Possibly blind. Anyway he would probably come to his senses and realise what a train wreck I was, or get up close and see my ugliness and give up, so I just kinda kept my head down and ignored it. I was way to insecure to muster the confidence to even look at him let alone go on a date with him.

But he didn’t give up. Eventually he got my phone number off one of the girls I sat with at lunch and phoned me on a sunday morning to ask me to the movies. So we went on that date.  And the weekend after that we went on another date. And I was so scared by this whole foreign dating thing and of what he thought of me that I’m pretty sure I didn’t say anything for the first five or so dates. I mean I’m sure I would have said ‘no thankyou I would not like a choc top’ and ‘why yes, tomb raider does look like a good movie” but aside from that I was silent.  He still didn’t give up. He walked me 6kms home from school in the afternoons, carrying my books while I stared at our shoes. After a couple of months I got to feel comfortable around him. Although for a long time I secretly believed him to be too good for me and was quietly aware that he would break up with me sooner or later. But even that feeling eventually went away.  We dated for over four years. He didn’t give up on me. I learned later that that first phone call John had made to see if I would come to the movies was very strategically timed, he phoned at 10 to see whether I would be at church or not. By divine appointment the first man to fall in love with me despite all of my baggage was a man who knew Jesus. When we did eventually break up it was because I was wanted to move back to Brisbane and study there and start again and go after God properly. We remained friends, he would fly down a couple of times a year and I would fly up a couple of times a year. He would phone me almost every night to see how my day had been. I left for Brisbane nearly three years ago now. And I’m writing because for the first time in a very long while we haven’t spoken at all this week. And it’s not because he’s on his mates property gold-panning again or I’m in the middle of exams. We’re just growing apart.