How did you meet your significant other?

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
21

Some really lovely stories in here. :slight_smile:

We met in high school in '05. I was a freshman, and he was a sophomore. I don’t remember the exact moment we met, but I’m fairly sure I know which mutual friend introduced us, since he liked getting the uber-nerds like my SO out into the sunshine a little bit. Back then, we both had a lot of other stuff going on in our lives, and so we hung out a little and kept vaguely in touch but never really became close and realized how much we had in common until last summer. We spent a lot of time together and had a lot of heart to heart conversations. I always thought he was attractive but that soon developed into seriously falling for him. Turned out he felt the same way.

Unfortunately, now we’re living in different states, but since my previous relationships were all conducted 100% online, long distance is doable for me and more than worth it.

22

We met on an online dating site, but there was almost zero communication prior to meeting. We went out for coffee at 10pm on a Sunday night, stayed up talking until 9 am the next day, skipped work to be with eachother, and spent the next 3 days pretty much attached at the hip. We were married 5 months later.

23

Particularly the ones that started long before I was born… and I’m old.

24

I met my wife in the late '80s at Macy’s Herald Square in NY. I was one of the floor managers in the ladies shoes department on the 6th floor, and she was a seasonal employee.

Although I managed the schedules of all the part-timers in ladies shoes, the only thing that stood her apart was her very noticeable Spanish accent. I never thought about whether or not I was attracted to her because, other than having to pull cash from her drawer for hourly drops, I rarely interacted with her.

One day, after New Years, when meetings were being held to determine which seasonal employees to cut and which to keep, she pulled me aside and asked if she could discuss something with me. I immediately suspected an attempt on her part to make a case to be among those to be kept on; she wasn’t the first.

I was wrong. She’d been interested in me for weeks, and was dropping hints all over the place that I was completely oblivious to. She said she’d had enough and decided to simply ask me out, and I was either going to say yes or no. I actually said I’d have to think about it. I mean, what would you do? Some chick I didn’t know from a hole in the wall was chatting me up out of nowhere. I think it’s only natural that my spidey sense was on alert. I also thought I was god’s gift to women back then, and was in no rush to be ensnared in anyone’s web.

I think I forgot about our discussion the very next day. A few days later, she approached me again, and our earlier conversation flooded back into my brain in an instant. I could tell she was a little annoyed, but she was my subordinate and it would have been inappropriate for her to express it more than a little, so she was polite about it, but asked if I’d thought about it any further. I admitted I hadn’t, but told her we could go out the upcoming Friday night after work.

For our first date, we went to a place called Beefsteak Charlie’s. The food was horrible.

My wife did all the heavy lifting in our relationship for the first year plus. It took quite some time for me to come around to the idea of permanence and sharing and planning for a future. If she hadn’t been so single-mindedly persistent and determined in that first year, we wouldn’t be together today; I certainly didn’t make it easy for her. Now, after over 20 years of marriage, it is very unpleasant to contemplate the possibility of life without her.

25

He was an intern at my company and sat in a cube kitty-corner from my own. I was one of the people who helped answer questions from interns at the time, so that put us into contact more often as well. It took almost a year for him to figure out that I was interested in him, partially because he’s oblivious about girls and partially because I didn’t have a lot of courage to just ask him out myself. It’s worked out just fine since he caught on.

26

Mine is a bit embarrassing. We met at a bar. She had recently come back from Europe and was having a sort-of welcome back party. The bar I was at was famous for meeting young, outgoing foreign folk like myself, so her friends called me over. We chatted for a while, and, while she was cute and fun, I wasn’t really interested at the time.

I got her number and went back to chatting up this other girl. Got her number too. I’m no Lothario; it was just a bar designed all around meeting foreign guys. Quasimodo would get a digit or three.

So, a few days later. I called the girl I was into, and, well, I made a horrendous mixup. Well, not so horrendous, as it was my future girlfriend :wink: Man, I was so oblivious. I kept on asking her about her job as a teacher, and when she explained she was a nurse, I was sure there was some kind of translation mistake… Well, not one to be stopped by faux pas(es?), we went out on a date and hit it off. We’re still in the early stages, coming up onto 6 months now, but we are very happy together.

27

We met at work. I was immediately determined to ensnare him, as he is tall and handsome and has an Irish accent. Our first few meetings consisted of parties where he’d get drunk and make a pass at me, then be extremely apologetic about it the day after.

28

Blind date, 2005. He grew up in the same small town as my cousin’s wife; Cousin and Mrs. Cousin had him over several times, and then set me up with him. We got married eleven months later.

29

Mig and I worked together in construction. I will never forget the first day he started working with us. He was so cute in his torn up blue jeans with a red bandanna on his head, wearing shiny black dress shoes. It was all he had.

I had a huge crush on him for about five months, but since he was 11 years younger than me and waaay out of my league smokin hot I knew it was wasted swoons. Then one day we were working alone, just hanging out waiting for some supplies to show with the other guys, when we started pitching this penny at each other. I was sitting on the floor and he kept getting closer and closer and the next thing I knew we were kissing. And it was AWESOME! :slight_smile:

We have been inseparable since that day, December 29th 2003.

30

We met online (some of you may know him as Dread Pirate Jimbo) in late 1999. We didn’t meet in real life until March of 2000 - just emails and phone calls for a couple of weeks before deciding to meet and get it over with (we had both been dating online for a while, and knew that you had to meet in person before you actually knew if it was a yes or no for going forward with someone). We had a mix-up at our first meeting - we met at a local restaurant with a lounge attached, and I was in the lounge, and he was in the restaurant. I was getting less than impressed, since late for your first meeting isn’t a great sign, but then we figured it out and all was good.

It’s funny, because he is a very quiet guy and doesn’t say much in crowds, but he started talking to me as soon as we sat down together, and we haven’t stopped talking 11 years later. :smiley:

31

In a writing group. I kept noticing her (later, she said, she kept looking at me because I was married and thus wouldn’t be asking her out), especially when I came over to her after class and praised one of her stories.

My marriage broke up when the class ended. Afterwards, we started dating.

32

In a hotel lobby, a bunch of us were signing in for an event. I looked over at the desk and saw the back of my old friend Dan as he filled out the registration form. So I went up to him and started giving him grief for holding up the line (all in good fun). At this point, Dan turned around and smiled at my sudden shock and said, “Hi, I’m Bob!”

The rest, as they say, is history.

33

At work. He had just been hired away from a customer and I had just been transferred from Calgary to Toronto. He had the most intense green eyes I’d ever seen (I later found out they were contacts, faker!). A couple of days after I was introduced we were standing around talking about a project when someone brought over an interoffice envelope. I had loaned some games to one of my office mates back in Calgary and they were returning them (SSI Gold box games). I was idly opening the package while we talked - as soon as the games were visible he broke off the business conversation and grabbed the boxes asking to borrow them. That led to an invitation to his groups D&D game and from there to living together within 6 weeks.

34

I blame Gary Gygax. :wink:

My wife, Chris, went to high school with Tony, a guy in my D&D group (I met Tony when he moved from Illinois to Wisconsin to go to college, and joined our D&D group). Chris (and another mutual high-school friend) came to town to visit Tony, and I met her then (early 1984). At the time, she and I were both dating other people, and, while we got along well, neither of us ever thought anything more of it.

5 years later, after I got my Master’s degree, I moved to the Chicago area, and Tony and I got an apartment together. A couple of weeks after I moved here, Tony invited me to come with him to a 4th of July party, and Chris was there. We were both unattached then, and hit it off…but then I didn’t see her again for 6 months (she was just in town for a few days, as she was still going to school, out of state). She finally graduated, and moved back to Chicago, at the end of 1989, and we started dating soon after that.

ETA – Moonlitherial, I’m very entertained by the fact that we now have two straight posts from Dopers who met their spouses through D&D. :smiley:

35

At work, when I was 19. I was a lifeguard, she was the blonde in the pink bikini. (Didn’t marry her until 35 years later)

36

I was waiting for an elevator in the dorm and got chatting with the girl next door. We were both going to the bookstore and decided to go together, she just needed to stop and pick up a friend of hers from home. “He’s a great guy,” she said. “You’ll love him.” That very night I found her pointing a plastic fork at me and announcing that he and I needed to go out. When she’s right, she’s right, but I still wish she hadn’t interrupted a conversation about his girlfriend to make the announcement.

37

On Usenet, in alt.atheism - or maybe talk.origins, they crosspost a lot - in about 1998. I was married, he had a defacto. We chatted about nothing via ICQ for years, maybe once, twice a month. He was in Australia, I worked weird hours, I saw him around (I worked at home, online.)

He split with his defacto, I got a divorce, he called me to cheer me up. We start dating on the telephone This is 2002. I visited, I went home, I came back. We got married in 2003, and will be married 8 years in May. I crossed an ocean to be with him and have never regretted it for a moment.

38

January 1972. She was visiting a friend from high school band camp who I had gone out with once or twice the summer before, but with no sparks. It was Independent Activities Period at MIT, so there was a lot of free time. I invited her to go ice skating, deliberately slipped so I could take her hand, and that was it.

39

2 years ago via the Photoswap app. We have an ocean between us we don’t know how to get rid of. For now we have to survive on our visits.

40

Your standard Meet Cute…she was nine years old, I was a drunk guy passed out on her lawn…
It’s around there that people usually think I’m kidding. Nope…but it’s not nearly as creepy a story as that makes it sound, either.