Back in the day, my girlfriends and I frequently enough found ourselves talking about the qualities we hoped to find in our future husbands as we spilled the tea on our latest dating misadventures. You know, as young women are wont to do. One day, probably out of boredom, we came up with a challenge.
More of a joke than anything else, the idea was to describe your ideal partner in just four qualities. The catch was, the combination of qualities should be so unique as to be practically non-existent. Thus, these idealized men were dubbed our "unicorns". For months afterward it was a sort of running joke that was shared with other friends, and we would text each other about having met a "2/4" or an elusive, yet very impressive "3/4".
None of us, though, had met a full unicorn.
Now, given that my unicorn was supposed to be a black Mormon cowboy who speaks French, this shouldn't take anyone by surprise.
Digression #1: When my dad heard about my unicorn list, he took issue with the fact that race factored among my "chosen" qualities. Admittedly, as my dating history will attest, I have a soft spot for gentlemen of the plentiful melanin variety. Which to be honest, I think was like a personal evolutionary adaptation necessitated by the fact that I tend to appeal most to a certain crowd. Play to your strengths, right? But I mean like, does the world really need to restock its supply of privileged white people? I'm totally happy to do my part to move humanity towards a global mixed race.😉
But just to be clear, I have never turned down or specifically pursued any potential dating options based solely on skin colour, and I'm not down with fetishizing people based on anything, least of all ethnicity. Please remember, the genesis of all this was a light-hearted challenge between girlfriends, not trying to develop some comprehensive checklist for a future spouse. And, full disclosure: I never, ever imagined I would meet —let alone actually end up with— someone who "qualified" as my unicorn.
So, to reiterate, on a scale of "dealbreaker" to "must have", Steve's being black basically amounts to "nice to have, all other things being equal".
All that being said, I obviously knew Steve was at least 3/4 before I even met him. I mean, he's a francophone African RM.
As we got to talking that long afternoon in his parents' apartment, I could see he was hitting most of the high points of what I meant by "cowboy", too. See, when describing my unicorn, I hadn't been able to come up with a better term to mean a "hard-working, family values-having, country music-loving adventurer with a booty made for blue jeans". I was actually pretty indifferent about the whole "rides a horse, herds cattle, dances two-step" aspect of... um... Cowboyness? Cowboyhood? Cowboyery?
In any case, Steve fit the bill much better than many more seemingly logical choices would have. I just wasn't holding out much hope for the country music bit.
Digression #2: Though baffling to some, enjoying country music was quite genuinely on my list of non-negotiables. Think of it this way: I love music, and country music makes up like 75% of the soundtrack of my life. Country music tends to have a pretty strong love/hate effect. I don't want to be with someone who is going to be annoyed 75% of the time when I am cleaning the house, chilling in the backyard or singing along on long road trips (though I suppose loving country music doesn't really take that last risk away. Fortunately Steve is ear-blinded by love. He actually requests me to sing for him on occasion.)
At some point during our first marathon chat, Steve and I turned our attention to music. He asked me to share some of my favourite music with him and for some reason, the first thing I wanted to share with him was the song that I grew up thinking I would play at my wedding. I had moved on to another song since then, but I still loved the first song. You never forget your first love, right?
So I turn it on, Shania Twain's From This Moment On.
And I kid you not, HE. STARTS. SINGING. ALONG.
Ok, so he didn't know all the lyrics perfectly. (To be fair, he also didn't seem to know all the lyrics to the English song he chose to sing to me at our wedding reception. He's francophone, the moment was overwhelming, give him a break). But right away he tells me he really likes country music, and soon I'm excitedly taking him through my favourite country playlist, trying to maintain my composure while silently freaking out.
Holy shitake mushrooms. I found my unicorn. He is real! He actually exists! Whaaaaaat????
Now, I'm not going to say that I knew then and there that Steve was my one and only— as I said, the unicorn qualities aren't actually ALL I needed to know, and I was battling some pretty big fear and insecurity. But I had a pretty good feeling. Recognition stirred deep within my soul and I hoped fiercely.
Just before Steve's parents came home that day, I queued up Colbie Caillat's Realize. Now, were Steve a completely fluent English speaker, the song would have been about as subtle as Trump's approach to... well, just about anything. I mean, consider the following excerpt:
If you just realize what I just realized
Then we'd be perfect for each other and we'd never find another
Just realize what I just realized
We'd never have to wonder if we missed out on each other now
As it was, it didn't bring about that stereotypical rom-com moment of mutual realization that culminates in a passionate kiss, but I'd like to think that the song eventually had its desired effect.
Now, looking back, I really appreciate Heavenly Father's sense of humor. That He chose to give me everything I truly needed in a partner in a way that was so on the nose about what I claimed to want makes me feel like we share a special inside joke, and also that He knows and loves me personally. I'm incredibly grateful that my Heavenly Father led me to my unicorn (even if it was a pretty winding road sometimes), and that he turned out to be even better than I had hoped.
I'm also so, so, so glad that the feelings are reciprocated... even if we haven't quite gotten to that point in the story just yet.
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