God Blessed the Broken Road

Dear Hays Free Press,

      I have a Senior Love Story and here is goes:

I am currently engaged to my first love, my true love and my last love.  My name is Donna and I live in Buda.  My fiancé is Bubba and he lives in Waco.  He just celebrated his 60th birthday in August and I turned 57 in June.  42 years ago, Bubba and I started dating.  It was really love at first sight, although we had been attending the same school for 6 years together.  We both knew of each other as it was a small school.  Bubba had attended Midway School for all 12 years and I was there for 4th through my 9th grade year. 

In May 1971, at the end of my 9th grade year, I was 14 and Bubba was 17.  One day as I was walking home from school, he was cruising the streets and literally ran over a curb in his 1964 Ford Mustang to stop and ask me for a ride home after school (I always walked home). I still have part of that tire that was ripped off when he hit the curb.  From that moment on, we dated the entire summer, inseparable.  At the end of that summer of 1971, because of my dad’s job, my family moved to Oklahoma. Bubba and I were

devastated. We were able to write each other every day (I still have all his old love letters) and visit via bus trip.  My family did not stay in Oklahoma long, and moved back to Texas and relocated to Austin 5 months later in January 1972.  Bubba and I were able to keep up the long distance relationship until November 1972.  By then, he was attending his freshman year at Tarleton State University and I was in my junior year of high school.  Trying to hold on to the a long distance relationship at that young age was hard for us, so we eventually broke up and lost contact, with only one phone call after that.  Bubba’s parents owned a Starter and Generator shop on IH 35 just south of Waco, so every time I drove past on my way north, I would always glance over to the shop to see if I could get a glimpse of Bubba, but I never did see him there outside.

As the story goes, we both had married and each had two children.  Bubba was married for 10 years and divorced in 1985 and I married right about that same time he divorced, was married for 20 years and divorced in 2004.  One day in December 2009, I was at work, bored and new to Facebook.  I was looking up people and wondered about Bubba, if he was on Facebook too. When I looked, there was his profile.  I sent him a “be my friend” message and that very night, I received an e-mail from him.  We communicated only via e-mail for four months.  At the time I sent that 1st e-mail, I had not dated anyone since my divorce and Bubba had dated little too.  That April 2010, he came to visit me at my grandson’s baseball game at the Manchaca Optimist field.  It was so wonderful seeing him after all those years. I recognized him immediately when we met for the first time in over 38 years apart. I took him to the Guitar Center, we had lunch at Hill’s Cafe, and went to the Buda Weiner Dog races.  We walked around downtown Buda and then to Cabela’s.  I did not want him to go home back to Waco that evening (he never moved from Waco and had been there all that time). The next month, in May 2010, he came down for a “real” date.  I took him to the State Capitol, Stevie Ray Vaughn’s statue at Lady Bird Lake and then we shared a wonderful sunset dinner at the Oasis.  It was magical and I kept telling myself “I know you, I remember your walk, your laugh, your smile, your sweet personality”.  I was hooked and so was he.  We really knew from the moment we saw each other again, that our relationship was going to pick up where we left off all those years ago.  We have been commuting back and forth between Buda and Waco for 3 ½ years now, keeping our love alive and loving every minute of each other’s company.

Bubba and I became officially engaged this past January 2013 and now are planning our wedding, which will be held on November 16th in a little wedding chapel in Hewitt, Texas.  The church is exactly between where I lived at Midway with my family and where Bubba lived on South IH 35 in Hewitt with his family when we started dating in May 1971.

For the last 3 ½ years that we have been dating again, we have had some obstacles that have proven that our love now can withstand anything.  Bubba lost his father 2 years ago to cancer, I had an accident shortly after we started dating again and broke my

back and wrist, I retired, but still work part-time and currently have another broken wrist!  And lots of other family drama and happiness to keep us going!

Bubba is the sweetest, most kind man I have ever know and he has stood by my me through thick and thin.  We know that our marriage will last until our final days and for all eternity.  We have a little saying for each other “One, Together, Forever”.  Our love song is “God Blessed the Broken Road” by Rascal Flatts as it truly tells our story of the broken road that led us back to each other’s arms.  We are truly blessed and thank God every day for allowing us to find each other and begin our love story again.

I hope this is a good “Senior” love story for you. We don’t feel like seniors, and we hope this story may inspire other’s that have lost a true love somewhere along the way and always wondered about them.  

Thank you!

Sincerely yours,

Donna Chamberlain

Buda, Texas