No puppy dogs or groupies. Sad!
P.S. I bet you remember exactly what you were driving.
Funny old world—this thread was started the very month I got together with The One who would be Wife 2.0
We worked at the same place. I walked past her one day on my way somewhere and she was all over her coworker: “Who is that” “That’s Inigo, and he’s very married.” Which was true, but not happily so. First time I noticed her I was all, “Damn, wish I wasn’t married.” Fast forward a couple years. She escapes a bad relationship at about the same time I’m still unpacking in my new home after divorcing my wife. The flirting starts, the fling starts. “We’re both on rebound, we’re coworkers, there’s a dozen other red flags. This is just for fun right?” “Oh absolutely!” I lied. We were engaged within two months, married within five. We’ve been amazing partners for coming up on ten years now and it’s still fantastic.
First marriage, well, we kind of got married because we had both run out of options and we had a long history together. It seemed like the reasonable thing to do. It was pretty cold from the start, and 10 of the next 15 years were easily the worst of our lives. If I had known the relationship I have with wife 2.0 was even a possibility, I would have never married Wife 1.0. The irony, of course, is that had I not married the first, I would never have crossed paths with the second.
Almost instantly. The OW was over to type a paper for a friend and from that time on I knew I could spend my life with her.
Little did I know it was a sentence and not a statement. 
I don’t know when I “knew”, but we dated for 4 years, were engaged for 2 and will hit our 30th wedding anniversary in a couple of months, so I guess whenever it did happen I “knew” good.
Dayum, we have been together now for 2/3rds of my life!
Mr.Wrekker and me had the ‘across a crowded room’’ incident. It was stunning to me, young and introverted and less than experienced. Him older, he had been around the block a few times. I just knew this was it. He decided, so he says, within the week, to persue me. It’s been a good run, 3 kids, and lots of memories. Wouldn’t change a thing. Retirement and grandkids has been the bonus we didn’t expect. We are happy.
I’ve read that men, generally, can tell very quickly - within minutes or even seconds - whether a woman is a potential wife for them, whereas women generally take considerably longer to evaluate whether a man could make a good husband for them or not. Not so much about physical appearance, but rather, the vibes a person gives off.
I knew my Beloved was the One as soon as I saw her. I recognized her from my dreams. 
No, not exaggerating. I’m being absolutely literal.
Other than trivial “hi how are you” smalltalk, my first significant statement to her was “Since we’ll be spending the rest of our lives together, we should get to know each other.”
That was 33 years ago. I don’t always get things right, but I think I absolutely was this time.
We’d been dating maybe a month, month and a half, and went to a party with some of his work crowd. At one point, he was outside in the backyard and noticed the host’s neighbor had a Dachshund puppy. And knowing how much I missed my Doxie, he got the neighbor to let me play with the puppy.
We met on a Memorial Day weekend. We moved in together on the following July 4th weekend. We’ve been together ever since.
Well, yeah. I’m still driving it (them).
OK, so now 25 years in and getting towards 26.
And she is still the one …
Now we’re thinking about retirement and travel though as something that can happen in the nearish future and now impossibly far away.
We went to a movie on Nov 12, and to dinner on Nov 13. He came over to my house for dinner on Nov 14 and told me (didn’t ask) that I’d marry him. I thought “Yeah, of course.”
We eloped on Dec 9, 1983, not quite 4 weeks after our first date. And we’re about to become grandparents any day now.
Still together.
Our kids are both now technical adults. Our son is living at home and working on an HVAC program, our daughter leaves us in June to be a camp counselor and then goes straight to college on the East Coast.
We’ve gotten rid of most of the CDs - I’d have a hard time finding a CD player.
The first day on OKCupid, for every single question I asked, she gave exactly the right answer.
Our 15th anniversary is at the end of this month
Wow, zombie thread!
I first met my wife in the 7th grade. We were friends for a long time and dated a bit in high school, then lost contact after we graduated. She moved back into the area 12 years later, one of us came across the other on Facebook (I don’t remember who), and when we met up I knew it right away.
So… 17 years.
.
Not a zombie, this one had a wake up after 10 years setting. So just a sleeper thread.
Sometime during the first few months of dating each other exclusively, I “knew.” But THE moment I remember clearly was about 10 minutes into our first date, when a comment she made about “camping” made me think I was on to something. I wuz right.
49 years later (48 of them married) we’re still each others’ best friend, childless by choice, and the biggest events in our lives are still the camping trips. Of course the backpacks and canoes and 4x4 wilderness explorations have gradually been replaced with travel trailers, as befits the doddering old farts we’ve become.
I have never heard Abuelito’s version, but Abuelita knew in their first conversation. She worked as cashier/treasurer in her uncle’s store; her merchant-sailor cousin had just arrived in town and dropped by on his way home. It was supposed to be a bare “hey family, my friend/coworker and I have arrived and I’ll see you tonight at dinner”, got a tad longer than that, and that afternoon when she left work she went to light a candle asking “please let it be him!” The friend/coworker aka Abuelito doesn’t seem to have needed much longer.
After thirty years of marriage, five children, twelve grandchildren and several great-grandchildren, we can confirm it was.
I knew the morning after we first kissed. I was still keeping a journal then, and that’s what I wrote that morning.
This fall will be 30 years since that kiss. Still seems to be working out.