Mom and I turned off University Avenue and pulled into the potholed parking lot outside a large, rustic building. The neon sign blazed out the name Wild E. Coyote. It was September 1992, and line dancing was the big thing in Cedar Falls, Iowa. Mom had been after me to go with her for weeks. “It’ll do you good to get out. A lot of your friends will be there,” she said. “Some folks from church. And who knows, maybe you’ll even meet someone.”
Yeah, right. It was fine by me if I never dated another man in my life. I was done with love. Still, I liked to dance and Mom wouldn’t quit asking, so I agreed to go. The place was packed with people in their Wranglers and cowboy boots, and country music was blaring. I’m not ready for this, I thought. But the more I twirled and stomped along with everyone else, the more I got into it. I had to admit, line dancing was the most fun I’d had in a long time. So I went back to the Wild E. Coyote. Mom and Dad were more than happy to watch Zak and Jesse.
One night in October I noticed this tall guy with feathered-back hair. He looked young, despite his scruffy attempt at a beard. He had on a plain button-down shirt with baggy jeans and sneakers. Whenever I saw him at the Wild E. I found myself watching him. He was always at the center of a group of friends. A few times I caught him glancing back at me. Then one night there was a barn dance. You took your partner and danced in a big circle, switching partners every eight beats or so. Right when the song ended, I was standing in front of the guy. “Want to keep dancing?” he asked.
“Sure.” He wasn’t a bad dancer.
He told me his name was Kurt Warner. We danced together till closing time. He walked me out to my car. I could tell he wasn’t ready to say good night.
I didn’t want to hurt his feelings, but better his now than mine later. “I want you to know I’m a divorced mother of two,” I said. “So if I never see you again, I’ll understand.”
Kurt was quiet for a second, then shrugged and said, “Hey, thanks for the dances.”
I got into my car thinking, That’s the end of that. Fine. I don’t need more heartache. I’d already had my share, and then some. I’d had to take a hardship discharge from the Marines to take care of my son, Zachary, after he was brain-damaged in an accident. Then my husband told me there was another woman. The divorce went through just a month after I gave birth to our second child, our daughter, Jesse. The kids and I moved back to my folks’ house. Men? Forget about it. My parents and the Good Lord, they were the only ones I could count on, or needed to. It’s just you and me now, Lord, I’d say in my prayers. And I trust you.
The next morning there was a knock at the door. I answered it with Jesse in my arms. Kurt stood there with a rose in his hand, smiling sheepishly. I was still in my bathrobe and hadn’t put on any makeup. “How did you find me?” I demanded.
He mentioned a mutual friend who’d told him where I lived. “I’d like to meet your kids,” he said.
A thousand things ran through my head, but what came out of my mouth was, “Okay, come on in.”
Kurt walked into the living room. Right away Zachary crawled over and grabbed his hand. Kurt barely paid attention to me. Instead he got down on his knees and tickled Zak. Soon the two of them were wrestling around and giggling. Zak looked sad when Kurt finally left a couple of hours later, with a quick “See you line dancing” to me.
I realized I’d never gotten to tell him what was wrong with Zak. In fact, it seemed like it didn’t matter to him. He was as happy playing with Zak as he had been at Wild E. Coyote surrounded by his friends. What was with this guy?
Kurt played football at the University of Northern Iowa. I had less than no interest in sports, but I did like spending time with him. People started teasing me about how I danced only with Kurt, and I reluctantly admitted that we were dating. At first I wondered why all our outings were at the Wild E. But then I realized neither of us had any money. He was just a college student and I was in nursing school. “Why don’t you come over to my parents’ house?” I asked one night. “We can microwave some popcorn and watch a movie with the kids.”
“Sounds great,” Kurt said.
That’s how we really got to know each other, all those movie nights in my parents’ living room. After I put the kids to bed Kurt and I would stay up and talk. If he had a game coming up, he’d get all excited and ramble on about plays and stuff. “You know I don’t care about sports,” I’d say. “I’ll pray you play your best, and I’ll even come to the game, but don’t expect me to understand what’s going on on that field.”
We talked a lot about faith. That and family. I found out Kurt’s parents got divorced when he was four. Late one movie night Kurt glanced at the floor, where some of Zak’s toys were strewn. “You’ve got great kids, you know. Think they miss having a daddy?”
“I can take care of them just fine, thanks,” I told him, maybe a little defensively. Zak and Jesse liked Kurt an awful lot. My mom liked Kurt too. So did I. But that’s all. He was just a real nice guy.
We had been seeing each other for about a year when I walked into the living room one day and found Kurt sitting on the floor playing with Zak. Watching them, I felt a surge of warmth. I caught myself thinking, Kurt’s so good with the kids. I bet he would be a great father someday. He had Zak’s magnetic writing board on his lap. Zak was just learning to walk. He picked up the board and tottered over to me. I took it and saw Kurt had written “I love Momma” for Zak. Underneath that he’d added, “I do too.”
Strange that the word love would make me feel such panic. I erased the board quickly and wrote, “I love my momma too.” There, that would keep things from going too far. I just wasn’t ready. I doubted I ever would be.
Kurt graduated in 1994 and went to the Green Bay Packers as a free agent. He didn’t make the cut. He came back to Cedar Falls with nowhere to live. So he moved into my parents’ basement. He got a job as a stock boy at the Hy-Vee grocery, making minimum wage. It was a tough time for him, for us both, but Kurt wasn’t about to give up.
About a year later he was picked up by the Iowa Barnstormers, an arena football team in Des Moines. It wasn’t the NFL, but it was pro football. I thought I would be okay with his leaving. I was tough; I’d been in the Marines after all. But one day when I went to visit Kurt, I found myself thinking, He loves me so much, Lord. I wish I could love him like that. Where had that thought come from?
Later that year my dad retired and my parents moved to Arkansas. I’d finished nursing school, passed my boards and gotten a job so the kids and I could afford our own place. Finally, I was making it on my own.
On Sunday night, April 14, 1996, my sister called. “I can’t talk long,” I told her. “You know Mom calls me every week, right after the Sunday night movie’s done.”
“Brenda—” There was a long pause. “Mom and Dad were killed tonight.”
I grabbed for something to hold onto and tried to absorb my sister’s words. Mom and Dad were killed tonight. A freak tornado had struck their house.
All I wanted to do was yell at God. I’d believed in him, trusted him. People said things like, “God needed your parents in heaven,” and I’d think, I needed them here!
No one really understood what I was going through. I would rant, “Why did you have to take them? Why did this happen after everything else that’s gone on in my life? It’s not fair! I can’t even trust you now, God!” Kurt just held my hand and listened. It was the only thing that helped.
I should have known from the moment he showed up at my front door, but I’d resisted. The kids fell for him. So did my parents. I guess I did too. I just couldn’t let myself trust that feeling—until after one of my tirades, when Kurt pulled me into his arms and held me for the longest time. I drew back and looked him in the eye. No one else on earth would stand by me like this. It was then I finally felt sure. Lord, you sent this man. You want me to trust you by trusting him. I’d loved Kurt for a long time. Now, at last, I was ready to accept it, to accept the man the Lord had brought to me.
On September 18 we closed on a new house in Des Moines. Kurt was doing well with the team, and he took the kids and me out to celebrate. He went whole hog: a limo, appetizers and dessert. He’s going to pop the question, I thought.
Kurt didn’t say much on the way over to the new place. I was the one who opened the front door. The floor was strewn with rose petals. I followed the path of petals out back to the dark patio. Kurt was right behind me. He stooped and turned on some music, then popped up with a rose in his hand, just like that morning he’d turned up on my doorstep. Strings of lights on the back fence flickered. Kurt reached into the rose and pulled out a ring. He got down on one knee and said the words that the lights on the fence spelled out: “Will you marry me?”
“Yes,” I said to Kurt. And to the love God gives, which I can trust in no matter what. Jesse and Zachary cheered. Then Kurt took me in his arms, and we danced out there under the stars.
