# How Did Your Parents Meet? **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [July 1, 2013, 4:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-your-parents-meet/662316 "2013-07-01T04:17:55Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![astorian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ad7895/32.png) [@astorian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/astorian)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2013, 4:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-your-parents-meet/662316/41 "2013-07-01T16:24:59Z")
My father studied at Maryknoll College, with the intention of becoming a Catholic priest. One of his classmates was a close friend of my Mom’s family (his Dad and my grandfather had been in the IRA together years earlier, and had been cellmates at Kilmainham Gaol). He introduced them. Needless to say, my Dad was never ordained! ---
**Author:** ![AuntiePam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/f19dbf/32.png) [@AuntiePam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AuntiePam)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2013, 4:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-your-parents-meet/662316/42 "2013-07-01T16:27:02Z")
My dad was already married when he met my mom. He was driving a taxi and that’s how they met. Mom got pregnant, dad divorced his wife and married mom. She was wife #2. When he died, a friend of his sent me his personal papers – which included seven divorce decrees. I have a half-brother somewhere. Mom met my stepdad when his car broke down in the little town where she lived. He’d been on his way to Chicago to take a job as a disc jockey, of all things. ---
**Author:** ![Maastricht](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/a88e57/32.png) [@Maastricht](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Maastricht)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2013, 4:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-your-parents-meet/662316/43 "2013-07-01T16:41:02Z")
> [@ThelmaLou](#): > > I would like to hear more about this. Seriously. Details, please. [Cool article in the New Yorker about modern arranged marriages.](http://nymag.com/nymetro/news/culture/features/11621/) ---
**Author:** ![Siam\_Sam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/d78d45/32.png) [@Siam\_Sam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Siam_Sam)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2013, 5:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-your-parents-meet/662316/44 "2013-07-01T17:10:12Z")
> [@Anaamika](#): > > **ThelmaLou** , of course! I’ll tell you what I know: > > My maternal grandparents were both dead, so my uncle arranged the marriage. This automatically put my mother at a disadvantage, since my mom didn’t have the elder generation to vouch for her, so my mother, who had been educated as a nurse and emigrated to the States, married someone rather beneath her in educational level. My dad only finished the tenth standard - which basically counts as high school. Dad’s family had some money, though, and mom’s family was dirt poor, so that was considered enough to make up for it. > > - Were there other suitors/bfs/gfs? \* > > They went through a marriage broker, so if there were, only my uncle met with them. Mom and Dad would have never met them before they were Ok’ed by Uncle. Dad says he had some girls chasing him in high school, but claims to not have been interested (I am positive this has been edited for my hearing). He was a handsome devil, as evidenced by pictures. But that is common for boys and when you get married it is expected you put these young loves aside. > > \*Did they like each other at first? \* > > I doubt they got to know each other very well before marriage, since Mom was here in the States and Dad in India. Maybe a couple of meetings, in front of the family, at most. But their first couple of years of marriage by all accounts seem to have been happy. In pictures of them they are smiling and much more affectionate than I ever remember them. They came back to the States right away. > > \*Would they have had veto power if they really didn’t like each other? \* > > Ye-es…but it would have been serious bad mojo. You don’t turn down a marriage proposal unless there is some major serious reason, and for a woman in my mother’s position, with no parents to speak for her, it would have been a very bad idea. They would have had to change marriage brokers, and word would have gotten around. > Of course if you find some horrible flaw that’s different but back in 1970s India you didn’t just say “Nope”. Nowadays it’s different in the upper and middle classes at least. > > \*Is there physical chemistry? \* > > Maybe there was in the beginning but I don’t remember any later. I mean, my parents always slept with the door open. They never held hands or even kissed on the cheek or even hugged, for that matter. As I grew older I became aware that other people’s parents had sex. I never had that light bulb realization, I just assumed when I was old enough they didn’t have sex. There are a few other things that evidence this that I’d rather not go into. Affection was a little bit lacking in my house. > > \*Are they a good match? \* > > No, they are not. My mom complained because Dad could never get a decent job, and for that matter, spent many years not working. When he did work, it was at a gas station - yes we fulfilled the stereotype. My mom busted her ass as a nurse for many many years. > > All that being said, everything seems to show that when Mom got sick from cancer - she died in 2010 - Dad went above and beyond in taking care of her. He was completely devoted to her, spending every moment with her, cooking anything she wanted, taking her to all of her doctor’s appointments, hand-feeding her, changing her, cleaning up after her. So in the end, my mom was truly happy she’d gotten him. Maybe he wasn’t intelligent like her or well-educated or even a hard worker but he was completely devoted. > > In the end I guess you take what you can, and she never had to be alone. > > So when I came of age, the idea of arranged marriage was raised, and hard. Now I’ve been in this country since I was four. I am American, I think pretty American. I am still pretty true to my culture in many ways, but I was not ready to have an arranged marriage. If I could have found a modern young Hindu man, with my ways of thinking, that might have been one thing…but the boys my parents brought home were not like that. They expected I would subjugate my career and my thoughts to him - I could succeed, but my primary responsibility was to make babies and run the house, and of course his mother would be living with us. Thank you! That was interesting. Before I came along, my Thai wife, who is ethnically Chinese, got a nudge toward an arranged marriage from her very traditional-Chinese parents, but she wasn’t interested in the guy and they never tried again. I’ve always thought one of the reasons they were so accepting of a farang (Westerner) like me is they thought she’d end up an old maid. ---
**Author:** ![ThelmaLou](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thelmalou/32/390_2.png) [@ThelmaLou](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ThelmaLou)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2013, 5:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-your-parents-meet/662316/45 "2013-07-01T17:34:46Z")
Anaamika, thanks for your story. So…are you married, dating? How’s your dad with that? His devotion did make up for other lacks early in their lives. ---
**Author:** ![Anaamika](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/5f9b8f/32.png) [@Anaamika](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Anaamika)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2013, 5:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-your-parents-meet/662316/46 "2013-07-01T17:43:56Z")
> [@ThelmaLou](#): > > Anaamika, thanks for your story. So…are you married, dating? How’s your dad with that? > > His devotion did make up for other lacks early in their lives. I’ve been with my SO - who is ethnically Chinese but born here and as American as anybody else - for seventeen years now. My mom _never_ approved of him, and even to her dying day she never really softened on that. My dad, on the other hand, at her wake, just straight up introduced him as my husband. That went a long way towards repairing my dad’s and my relationship, which was basically non-existent. ---
**Author:** ![Anaamika](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/5f9b8f/32.png) [@Anaamika](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Anaamika)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2013, 5:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-your-parents-meet/662316/47 "2013-07-01T17:55:08Z")
Ok, I read that article about arranged marriage. I agree with the author in a lot of stuff. I’ve often thought that if I hadn’t been with someone in my thirties and wanted it, I might have been more amenable to such a thing. It’s not as much about the other guy, as knowing yourself well, and knowing what you want or don’t want. Hell, no one’s perfect. But I was lucky enough to get a great guy early in my life and I’ve stuck by him ever since. ---
**Author:** ![JohnT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johnt/32/15048_2.png) [@JohnT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JohnT)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2013, 6:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-your-parents-meet/662316/48 "2013-07-01T18:37:11Z")
I posted this story before in an earlier thread I started called [OMG!!! I just read the “…” in my parents wedding album!](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=564849) > [@](#): > > My mother passed away in 1968 when I was a year old, my father passing away 39 years later. After he died, I was given a large amount of personal papers and such from their time together in the 1950’s and 1960’s, including the only picture I have ever seen of my four siblings and mother and father together. > > So I’m reading their wedding album more closely and I notice that there’s an extended section of her writing about the time she met my father, including her original observations, etc. > > > [@](#): > > > > "When I first met B. I couldn’t stand him, I thought he was so arrogant! I was with Stacey C. and Kat at a mixer, and there he was in the middle of everybody, thinking he was the king of the world. > > > > We met again that spring at another function, and talked. He was much less arrogant, and I learned that we grew up a few blocks from each other in Charleston! It ended with him asking me for a date. > > > > We went to Skeenie’s for a quick dinner, then went to see “Oklahoma!”\*\* …we went for a drive…\*\* I barely made it for curfew." > > So I guess it’s true, that scene in _Mamma Mia!_ about the “dot dot dot’s”. And this was a double-triple-dot, I guess for added emphasis. > > It’s very sweet and all, but still… this was the **first date** , mom! ---
**Author:** ![Barking\_Dog](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/ccd318/32.png) [@Barking\_Dog](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Barking_Dog)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2013, 6:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-your-parents-meet/662316/49 "2013-07-01T18:50:03Z")
My mom ran my dad over while he was riding his bike to class at University of Texas. ---
**Author:** ![Sampiro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/2acd7d/32.png) [@Sampiro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sampiro)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2013, 6:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-your-parents-meet/662316/50 "2013-07-01T18:54:23Z")
Ninth grade English class. My mother was the class president and my father was the teacher. (Yep, I’m serious. They waited until she was 16 to marry, though.) ---
**Author:** ![Anaamika](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/5f9b8f/32.png) [@Anaamika](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Anaamika)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2013, 6:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-your-parents-meet/662316/51 "2013-07-01T18:59:27Z")
> [@Barking\_Dog](#): > > My mom ran my dad over while he was riding his bike to class at University of Texas. I like this one the best. Talk about meet cute! ---
**Author:** ![TriPolar](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tripolar/32/3008_2.png) [@TriPolar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TriPolar)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2013, 7:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-your-parents-meet/662316/52 "2013-07-01T19:05:17Z")
My parents met when both were attending Vanderbilt. My father was a grad student, mom was an undergrad. That’s all I know. ---
**Author:** ![Maastricht](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/a88e57/32.png) [@Maastricht](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Maastricht)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2013, 7:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-your-parents-meet/662316/53 "2013-07-01T19:09:03Z")
Funny… I met my husband online, and I’ve got transcripts of our earliest chats on MSN. Maybe my son, or my grandkids, might like to read them one day. ---
**Author:** ![a35362](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/3da27b/32.png) [@a35362](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/a35362)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2013, 7:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-your-parents-meet/662316/54 "2013-07-01T19:30:22Z")
They met at a party. _yawn_ ---
**Author:** ![epbrown01](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/7ba0ec/32.png) [@epbrown01](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/epbrown01)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2013, 8:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-your-parents-meet/662316/55 "2013-07-01T20:04:23Z")
They served together in the military. ---
**Author:** ![Skywatcher](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/skywatcher/32/254_2.png) [@Skywatcher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skywatcher)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2013, 8:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-your-parents-meet/662316/56 "2013-07-01T20:08:33Z")
They met at the library where Mom worked after school, stereotyical boy seeing girl at her job until he gets up the nerve to ask her out. For years I thought the library was in Honolulu because Mom’s aunt - who raised her - lived there and Dad was stationed at the Navy base for a while during the war. Turns out they met in the city where Dad grew up when Mom moved there with her cousin & aunt. ---
**Author:** ![Shodan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9f8e36/32.png) [@Shodan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shodan)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2013, 8:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-your-parents-meet/662316/57 "2013-07-01T20:47:51Z")
My mom and dad were in confirmation class together. My mother’s mother met my grandfather because he was in France during WWI, and my grandmother wrote to him as a school project. Then after the Armistice, he asked if he could visit her. They were married 36 years. He died about fourteen years before her. She died calling his name. Regards, Shodan ---
**Author:** ![ThelmaLou](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thelmalou/32/390_2.png) [@ThelmaLou](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ThelmaLou)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2013, 9:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-your-parents-meet/662316/58 "2013-07-01T21:00:25Z")
> [@Anaamika](#): > > But I was lucky enough to get a great guy early in my life and I’ve stuck by him ever since. I’m really happy for you (even though I don’t know you). I like love to triumph. 🆒 You were very lucky. So was he. ---
**Author:** ![etv78](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/d78d45/32.png) [@etv78](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/etv78)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2013, 9:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-your-parents-meet/662316/59 "2013-07-01T21:12:38Z")
Worked in a Shaw’s together (supermarket). He’s was a stocker, she a cashier IIRC. ---
**Author:** ![etv78](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/d78d45/32.png) [@etv78](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/etv78)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2013, 9:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-your-parents-meet/662316/60 "2013-07-01T21:18:29Z")
> [@Telemark](#): > > They met at a mixer in the Catskills, played tennis the next day, and started dating when they got home from the weekend (Dad is from Jersey, Mom from Brooklyn). So, they had “Time of their lives”? 😉 [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-your-parents-meet/662316.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-your-parents-meet/662316.md?page=4)