Happy Father’s Day to these two fellows in this photo. I need to share a “little story” to explain how extra special these guys are to me.

The summer between my freshman and sophomore year of college, I moved to Isle of Palms. I absolutely loved my summer in the Charleston area! I made wonderful friends and had so much fun. I was at the Windjammer so much I was like Norm in the TV show Cheers.

When I returned home to Florence, I reflected on my shaky freshman year at USC. I concluded living on campus and not having decent food was the reason for my terrible grades. (I never considered that my partying had anything to do with it.) I transferred from USC to FMU, lived at home, enjoyed my moms cooking, but I continued to party at wholesale. I couldn’t connect the dots between partying and bad grades. My brain was not functioning, probably soaked with alcohol!

Christmas rolled around and my grades came in. I got 2 Cs and 2 Ds. I ran some quick math. Transferring in my USC grades actually helped pull them up because the bad grades didn’t transfer. PHEW!

That fellow on the front right hand side of the photo “cut through the crap”, ignoring my crafty math, thought about how much money he sunk into this disaster and said “we are kicking you out”. 😱👎

WAIT A MINUTE! What did you say? Before he explained the details he said “one day you will thank me for doing this but right now you won’t get it. “

He said we are no longer paying for your college, it’s time for you to move out and get a job. We will help get you setup in your FIRST place but that’s it, you choose to move around, that’s on you.

So immediately I start thinking about places in my safety net of Florence. He then said “you talk about how great Charleston is, why don’t you move there?”

OH MY GOD! Leave my safety net? But wait he’s right Charleston is soooo much better than Florence. Hmmmmm.

HOLY CRAP! At age 19 that’s a HUGE move! But damn, he had a great idea! I loved LOVED LOVED Charleston. I figured Mt Pleasant would be better and less expensive. Within 2 months I completely relocated and got a job working retail at Gwynns.

After a year getting paid $4.00 per hour and earning my first real paid vacation, I stepped back and thought there had to be better options long term. I did not enjoy my job. I decided I needed to revisit getting my degree. I took one class at the College of Charleston to show my dad I could do it. I loved it!

Dad put many stipulations on my return to school but basically I got my act together and finished college, over the next 12 years I got married, bought a house, had my first child, passed my CPA, moved to my dream neighborhood, had a successful business and finally had a girl in an family of only boys, ultimately four kids! Life was REALLY good!

Then in Y2K my marriage blew up. 😱

I was overwhelmed with what was happening. It wasn’t just a little bad, it was off the charts bad. Thank GOD my parents had my back.

After struggling living in Mt Pleasant alone, it was obvious this wasn’t a good long term situation. My parents helped me figure out a way to move back to Florence. By Jan 2001 the older kids started a new school and we moved.

Moving is scary especially as a single person, I had to navigate making new friends and I got involved in several singles groups, one of them was Divorce Care. It was these circles where I eventually found my husband. I found people I could do things with. Any dates that I had at this time were awful. A waste of time and energy. 👎

Eventually it was these circles of new friends that I ended up connecting me and Tim indirectly. We finally had our first official date right before Thanksgiving. Surprisingly Tim wasn’t scared off by the fact that I had four kids with two in diapers.

Our connection was instant, but we both wanted to be mindful of our kids, he had two and I had four. We were like the Brady Bunch. It wasn’t perfect but it worked. We took our time getting things in order and finally married after three years of dating. Around the same time my battle zone of court finally ended.

We moved in a wonderful house together and the kids created new memories of our blended family. Some include cracking pool sticks in half, some include family photos for our Christmas cards, some include happy birthday celebrations and some include burying beloved pets. Some include running through the sprinklers on the golf course and some include the dog escaping the electric fence. Some included playing in the woods and some included sneaking on the roof.

We have lots of memories and stories to share. My kids all bounced back home after moving out and found a soft place to land. They have all benefited from Tim’s strong budgeting skills, and the importance of a college education. He adds a new set of ideas to help guide when we hit challenging times. Each child has had their unique issues and have successfully found independence.

Tim is very shy & quiet but shows his dedication and unconditional love in his own way. I still cannot believe he stepped into this situation when others ran. In fact I would have run, but boy am I glad he didn’t. We are all so blessed to have both of these awesome father figures help guide our kids to success.

Happy Father’s Day to my dad John & to my husband Tim! We love you more than you will ever know!