Tell me about meeting your spouse/SO

Honestly, our whole story began shortly after the birth of my first child. My brother gave me a book to read to help keep my sanity while staying up with the baby. I was, at the time, married to a man who had little interest in me or anything I said or did: I was basically the housekeeper/babysitter. I had a lot of hours in the day to fill up, so I had requested a big, thick paperback book. My brother delivered The Eye of the World by Robert Jordan. That was in 1991.

Fast forward to 1997. I was in the process of extricating myself from a bad marriage, and I was lonesome, depressed, and generally certain that I would be alone for the rest of my life. Nobody marries a divorcée with two small children. I did, though, have internet access, and was a regular member on a Sci-Fi Fantasy BBS dedicated to Robert Jordan. It was the only BBS of which I had ever been a member until this one. I didn’t shop on the internet. I didn’t belong to AOL or any online dating sites. When I logged on, I checked my mail and then went to read the bulletin board, and maybe chatted on the site’s chat a while if the kids were asleep. Barely a month into my membership there, I made several friends(who to this day I still consider very good friends and try to see them whenever I can -"Hi! Draelin! :slight_smile: ), and I got talked into downloading this crazy new message program called ICQ. So I did and developed a small list of folks who I could talk with at any hour of the day or night. Now, I wasn’t looking for anything more than someone with whom I could have an adult conversation, and besides, we were pretty far flung: California, North East Coast, Canada, Denmark, Great Britain, Australia, etc. Romance was the furthest thing from my mind.

I added a fellow named Stonebow to my ICQ friends list on September 2, 1997. He was very witty, well read, and seemed genuinely interested in talking to me. We chatted back and forth, emails, and ICQ for about a week until one of us (and I honestly don’t remember which) suggested a phone call. Naturally, I was terrified. I desperately want to make a good impression, but I have quite an accent, I am in Arkansas, and I was, at the time, working as a payroll secretary. He was at UPENN, had graduated from Deerfield Academy in MA, and seemed so cultured. I felt hopelessly outclassed, kind grubby and small, but I didn’t imagine it would hurt to talk to him. He had the most beautiful voice…like honey. We talked of several mundane things, hobbies, and interests, but by the time I hung up the phone, I was in love. I had those internal monologues, too, about being crazy…and I haven’t even lain eyes on this person! He could be a troll (the hairy kind that live under bridges or overpasses) or an ax-murderer! He wasn’t though.

Three and a half months later, I found myself at the airport in Little Rock to pick him up. He’d flown down to visit for the new year, and it would be the first time we’d seen each other in person. We’d each seen a small snapshot of the other, but pictures leave a lot out. I still chuckle over the fact that I dressed to go to the airport like I was dressing for a cocktail party. I changed clothes at a friend’s house after work on my way to the airport, and she assured me that by midnight, my dismembered body would probably be floating in the river behind my house. I drove to the airport and literally snuck in the furthest side door I could find. I slowly walked toward the waiting areas and tried see him before he saw me. Stonebow was sitting on a bench, facing the window and reading. I couldn’t tell much from behind him, but for some reason, he chose that moment to look up and out the window. My reflection was in the glass, so he turned around and I froze. I could not breathe or feel my legs. If I had tried to walk they would have broken off at the thigh. I try to rationalize the nimbus of light that seemed to float around him by attributing it to the fact that I still wasn’t breathing. If he hadn’t walked up and put his arms around me, I would have collapsed or shattered or both. Then he kissed me, and words fail me at that point. It was like every fiber of my being shimmered and then settled into place, like my whole entire life had been a holding pattern until this point, and now time could move forward. Love seems a very poor, insufficient word to describe what I felt.

We married in May of 2000, and have added one more child to our happy little family. I have a small ceramic sun catcher hanging on my kitchen window that says “and they lived happily ever after”. Yes, that’s it exactly.

I was living by myself in a tiny town in rural Ohio. 25 years old, a college grad in an area where I just wasn’t about to meet anyone for a likely romance.

I got over a thousand replies to an internet singles ad I put online in 1996. Lots of nice guys and a few meetings in person. One guy started our correspondence with a joke about Carl Sagan. That was October of 1996.

Christmas that year was rough. I wasn’t feeling too well, emotionally. I was talking to all these nice men and really thought I felt something pretty special for one guy from Connecticut, but after the holidays I could tell that it wasn’t going anywhere. I think it was my first major depreessive episode. January passed in a horrible blur, then February hit and the guy I had met in October asked me to come to Kentucky to meet him over a weekend.

I agreed. I climbed out of the car, he was standing there and gave me a big hug and said, “Will you marry me?”

A handful of those replies led to talking on the phone and meeting in person. I fell in love. Oh, well, fine. It was more like falling deeply in like, with a guy from Connecticut. I liked everything about him. He was perfect and I wanted him. I knew I wanted him and I wasn’t going to stop wanting him! He started drifting away, and I met someone else one weekend when I really felt like hell. The someone else? So not for me! Sure he was funny and smart and all, but he wasn’t The Guy. Sure, I met him and he was amazing and he was the best hugger in the world, but he wasn’t The One. And when I told The One that I had met this Other Guy, The One sounded kinda glum, but maybe kinda relieved, too? But no! He couldn’t sound relieved because he was The One and this Other Guy was just a guy and not The One and the hugs and the conversation and the laughter and the love I was getting from the Other Guy just couldn’t make up for the fact that he wasn’t The One and The One was drifting and drifting and drifting and then, of course, I married the Other Guy because I was completely in love with him and invited The One to the wedding.

I was living by myself in a tiny town in rural Ohio. 25 years old, a college grad in an area where I just wasn’t about to meet anyone for a likely romance.

I got over a thousand replies to an internet singles ad I put online in 1996. Lots of nice guys and a few meetings in person. One guy started our correspondence with a joke about Carl Sagan. That was October of 1996.

Christmas that year was rough. I wasn’t feeling too well, emotionally. I was talking to all these nice men and really thought I felt something pretty special for one guy from Connecticut, but after the holidays I could tell that it wasn’t going anywhere. I think it was my first major depreessive episode. January passed in a horrible blur, then February hit and the guy I had met in October asked me to come to Kentucky to meet him over a weekend.

I agreed. I climbed out of the car, he was standing there and gave me a big hug and said, “Will you marry me?”

I laughed and said no. He just smiled.
I went home. He asked if we could see each other for Valentine’s Day and I said I didn’t think so.

I got a call on V-Day or the day before (can’t remember the precise dates) that said he had been hospitalized. I drove back down and spent the next couple of days in his hospital room.

“Will you marry me?”

“No.”
Two months later, he came to Ohio to visit me.

“Will you marry me?”

“I don’t even know why you’re bothering to ask. You know I will.”

“I know.”

And so we got married. Our seven year anniversary is coming in January.

China Guy Wrote:

The only way you could possibly improve this story would be if you said your first words to her were, What’s Happenin’ Hot Stuff?.
Sideline: Where did a westerner like yourself learn to speak fluent chinese?

Long story.

I was at the tail-end of a seven year relationship. We weren’t realy talking. My ex was repeatedly spending nights away with no explanation of where she’d been. Things were on the way out, though I was in denial.

Meanwhile micilin befriended me, and one night in the pub he introduced me to yojimbo, as well as mrs micilin and some of her friends. There was one particularly striking girl there. Very tall, very very pretty, the most amazingly long legs, tons of bright cerise-dyed hair, and the biggest brown eyes I’d ever seen. I asked micilin “wow, who’s that?” “That’s mrs micilin’s very well put-together friend,” he replied.

Eventually me and the big-eyed girl got to know each other, and we got on really well. As my ex spent more time away from me, I spent more time with the other woman. It was nothing more than a friendship in my mind, because she was way out of my league. Despite not being particularly good looking and somewhat lacking in the height department, I’ve gone out with some pretty good-looking women before, but this girl was about two echelons of babe above what I even thought was remotely achievable for someone like me.

Then, finally, me and the ex split up. The next day I met the big-eyed girl for a drink and told her what had happened. And she confessed that she fancied me. I was blown away, and that was all I needed to kiss her. I was delusional, though, thinking that the end of a seven-year relationship wouldn’t affect me.

Of course a couple of weeks later, the end of such a long relationship hit me. My emotions imploded into severe depression, and I dumped the big-eyed girl, and moved to the US to get away from everything. I spent six months in Connecticut in isolated depression, drinking heavily.

Then the company went bust, and I was kicked out of the country by the INS. I arrived back in Ireland just before Christmas, where my ex had said I should stay with her. I got a cab from the airport, my life in ruins, no home, no job, nobody in my life. I arrived outside my ex’s house at 6 am, and then I made a decision that would change the course of my life forever. “Sorry, I’ve changed my mind,” I said to the cabbie. “Can you drive on to blabla street instead?”

I woke up the big-eyed girl. “Do you mind if I stay here?” “Of course,” she replied. Jetlagged, I slept through the day, and when she came back from work, we went to the pub and got drunk. That night, I was sleeping in her room. I asked “should I sleep on the floor, or in the bed?” She replied “the bed”, and we’ve been together ever since then. That was seven years ago, and we got married in 2002. :slight_smile:

I forgot to say: even though I never considered it, mrs jjimm insists that from the moment she met me, she knew I was The One. When I moved to the States, she was terribly upset, but she said to a friend at the time that despite this, her pain was alleviated because she was still completely sure that I was the man she would marry. And I was.

Short story:

Dated many guys (duds), decided to go it alone. 35 years old, never married, lived in great apartment, had cat, saturday night, also had many glasses of wine, read personals in local newspaper and said “women dial free”…so dialed, answered, pushed 1 for smoker, 2 for 35-42, 3 for guy…“one ad meets your requirements” and I HEARD THE GREATEST, SEXIEST VOICE ON EARTH. Leave somewhat drunken message, “no, I’m not thin, I’m sorta round”.

After two days, start first of many long, long phone calls (lived one town apart, about ten minutes), weeks go by, finally meet, both kinda “yeah, you’re ok”…went from cool to steamy … got married five years ago and he’s the best husband in the world for me! :slight_smile:

Welcome Aboard, CanadianGirl

Great first post. It’s all down hill from here!

Has all the elements we like to read about: drunken nights at home alone with the cat, leaving embarrassing messages on some strangers answering machine and a Happy Ending!
YAY!

It is expected that you waste loads of bandwidth discussing how cute your little cat is too. In fact, I think it is apart of the initiation here now. Which is why I want a cat. So then I can get The Goat.

Scene: January-February 2002. Freshman year of college. My first real relationship starts eroding and finally ends. The other guy and I had been dating off and on for about two years, and I’d lost my virginity to him. I was a complete and total basketcase. I didn’t know what to do, and, honestly, I thought there was no chance of me ever meeting anyone ever again. I didn’t think anyone would WANT to date me.

In a desperate bid to have some notion of a life, I join Alpha Phi Omega, and I meet a guy who happens to be gay. So, of course, there’s no chance of romance, and as a result I open up. I feel free to be me for the first time in forever. He’s three years older than me, and is graduating at the end of the semester.

He, of course, graduates. I am depressed. . .but also loads more confident. I’m happy. I don’t particularly want to date my ex ever again–I think I can do better. And, additionally, I don’t feel like I need a boyfriend. I go home that May ready to, if not conquer the world, at least have a decent summer.

New scene: June 2002. An old friend from middle school IMs me. We hadn’t really spoken in a couple of years. She screwed up her knee, and needed someone to drive her to her job so she could pick up her paycheck. So I think, “What the Hell?” and drive her.

We get to talking. Her and her boyfriend–who I’ve never met–are involved in a Live-Action Role-Playing game about 40 miles away. She invites me to come to game that Friday. At first, I’m reluctant. I’m a bit of a loner, and getting me to do ANYTHING that involves meeting new people is like pulling teeth. I find out, though, that one of the people working with me at my summer job also plays in this game. This assures me that, even if my friend decides to spend all night with her boyfriend, I’ll be able to chat up my co-worker. I decide to go.

In anticipation of the event, I buy a shirt to use as a costume. It’s burgundy lace, and I wear it over a tank top. Unfortunately, being a little bit wardrobe-challenged, I put it on backwards, exposing my chest a lot more than I usually do. This is important.

I go to game dressed like this. I’m introduced to the ST. He seems nice enough. After game–which he called early–he comes to talk to me as I’m sitting at a table, just sort of watching the action. We talk for about an hour. He hands me a card with his contact information on it–name, phone #, cell phone #, AIM, ICQ, Yahoo! ID, etc., etc. I, of course, think he’s doing this for ST reasons–I’m not the brightest angel in the heavens sometimes–and say, somewhat jokingly, “You want me to return the favor?”

He says sure, and I do. Then I have to go home. The next morning, I’m out with my parents. When I get home, there’re calls from him on my answering machine and my cell phone.

Crap, I think. Something’s wrong with my character sheet.. (At this point, I thought there MIGHT be another reason, but my rational mind tells me this is impossible.

We talk some more. We skirt around the subject. Finally, I ask, “Are you interested?”

He says, “Would I be calling you if I weren’t.”

Two years and some change later, we’re married.

Points of amusingness:

The shirt I wore backwards attracted his attention. Not because of the cleavage (though that didn’t hurt), but because I was so totally clueless about the leering I was getting.

It took an hour of cajoling by my friend’s boyfriend (who’s one of my husband’s best friends) to get him to call me. Including my friend assuring him that, yes, I was indeed single.

I think I’m going to go give him a smootch, now…

I was 19 and had just broken up with my first serious (by serious I mean we had sex) boyfriend for the third time in 6 months. I was pissed off at him because he had just told me he only dated me because he was trying to get closer to my (married) sister.
So, I decide to sign up for some online personals. I would get a boyfriend who actually liked ME and live happily ever after, while he lusted after my (married) sister.
A few weeks go by and I don’t hear from anyone. Finally someone from Rhode Island e-mailed me. That went nowhere, but it did open me up to the idea of actually e-mailing someone myself.
This particular website matched you to people by how well you matched them, how well they matched you, and how well you matched each other. Only one guy matched me as well as I matched him so I e-mailed him. He lived about 40 miles away and was actually looking for someone who was a little older.
Anyway, we started e-mailing back and forth. We did have some things in common. His favorite book was The Hitchhiker’s Guide (this was a big plus), he is the youngest of 3 (me too), we smoked the same cigarettes, we were both closet geeks. I knew from the first e-mail he sent me that we’d be great friends at the very least.
After two weeks of e-mailing, we finally talked on the phone. From the first time I heard his voice, I was in love. He was attracted to my voice but for different reasons. Apparently, I’d make a fortune in the phone sex business (some of my customers have confirmed that opinion).
After a week of phone calls, I drove out to his town to meet him. We had lunch at Friendly’s. I went back to his house. He was 26 and still lived with his parents and older sister (who was pregnant and very bitchy) because he was saving up to buy his own home. I met his family, had dinner with them and watched the Simpsons. Then, we went to a movie. I picked and it sucked more than you can possibly imagine.
We stayed up all night talking. He admitted that he fell in love with me the first time he saw me. At 4:00 am, right after we admitted to each other that we were in love, I finally gave up on the idea of going home. I slept in his room (no sex) and went home around 4:00 the next day.
Right after getting home, I called the police to have them cancel the missing persons my roommate had filed :eek: . I then called my sister and best friend so they’d stop worrying about me. For some reason, none of them ever thought of calling my cell phone :smack:

So, the next day, I got fired for missing work the previous day. I was really sad, not about the job because I hated it. I was sad that I got fired before I could quit. I went to see him again and I ended up staying at his parent’s house for over a month while I got myself together.
By the time I went home, I was totally in love with his family and his sister had become one of my best friends.

5-1/2 years later: We’ve lived together for 4 years, engaged for 3-1/2. We’re still very much in love. We’ve had really bad arguments but they always work out in the end (usually with sex :smiley: ). We’ve come close to breaking up a few times (always due to my issues) but he’s helped me work through the problems. He got me interested in Red Dwarf and Tolkein. I got him interested in Buffy and Country music. I still adore his family and he likes mine. Thanks to him, I’m more happy with myself and I’ve come to terms with my screwy childhood. I have mostly worked through my stability issues. The fact that we’ve been together this long and I’ve had the same job for 3 years proves that! Thanks to me, he gets up on time for work every day!

We don’t agree on everything but we don’t care. He thinks I’m a commie because I don’t like most of the foods he likes. I think he’s braindead because he can listed to U2 without having an anuerism.
He still doesn’t understand how my family can stand to be spread all over New England and New York. I still don’t understand how his family can all stand to live in the same small town. He still doesn’t understand how I can watch Horror movies. I still don’t understand how he can watch Star Wars.
But, I think the differences help to compliment the similarities. If we liked all the same things, life would probably be pretty boring.

We will eventaully get married and have children - just not any time soon. I’m only 24 and I just returned to college so I’m not quite ready for that. I still have some more issues to work through. I still occassionally have moments of panic where I want to sell all my possessions and move to another country (stability problems again - 9 foster homes in 6 years can do that to the most level-headed people). I can’t get married until those are under control.

Yep. His opening actually translates to “Miss, how are you?”.
Which is soooooo polite… :smiley:

Rico and I met at a church dance in 1974. I was 17… he was 16. We dated most of the year and had planned a date for New Year’s Eve.

My grandmother died Dec. 29, 1974 and when I told him I had to break our date because my grandmother died, his 16 yr old insecurities kicked in and he had himself convinced he’d been dropped so I could go out with a better guy. He never called again and in those days, good girls didn’t call guys… unless it was to cancel a date according to my mother.

In 2000, he was in charge of looking up classmates for his 25 yr high school class reunion. We went to different schools so I wasn’t on his list to find, but he started thinking about me and wanted to see if he could find me. I wasn’t hard to find. When I divoriced my 1st husband, I had taken my maiden name back. I’d been divorced 22 yrs and had no intentions of remarrying again. I was totally self sufficient and happy the way things where. He had been divoriced 13 yrs and planned to stay that way too, so there was no pressure on.

He emailed me and I responded. At that point he still believed he’d been stood up all those years before. I had to show him the Social Security Death Index for him to believe me. Since then, he’s seen the death certificate and had several relatives vouch for me too. Anyway, we spent the next year getting to know each other again. We lived in different states so it was a long distance thing. Email, IM, and the phone. It got to the point that we both felt pretty much like there was no question we were ment to be together but thought it wise to see each other before committing.

When I opened the door and saw him standing there (he’s 6’6" and I’m 5’2"), I jumped straight up and grabbed a hold of his neck and it was a done deal. (I’m still waiting for him to ask me to marry him. ) That reunion took place Memorial Day weekend 2001 and we were married Sept 8, 2001… 3 days before 9/11.

He still can’t get over that I kept his picture he had given me in 1974 and I’m still a bit at aww that he sensed when we met in 1974 that we would be together and things just weren’t right for him in his life until he “got his Kathy”. Once he came back into my life, I realized that something had been missing, but didn’t realize it and probably wouldn’t have had a clue what it was if I had noticed it.

I hadn’t ever forgotten him and had always wondered what had happened to him. When we were kids he spelled his name the traditional way of Rick, but when a song became popular that had the lyrics of “Don’t loose that number Rikki”, I thought of him everytime I heard it and at first kept hoping he’d call again. Until he did finally call again, I thought of him every time I heard that song and wished he’d called. I always remembered him as being the only guy I dated I felt comfortable with and totally safe.

There is still no better place, or safer place, then in his arms!!!

I am truely the most lucky woman in the world :smiley:

Awwww some of these stories are so sweet!

I first met MaxBabe on ANZAC day, 2003. I’d watched the parade with some Navy mates, and their friends. After that we went to an RSL club in the city and I was the only RAAF-lover in a room full of Navy people. We had a few drinks then finally went to the local gay bar (the Wickham, for you Brisbane locals). By that point I was very tired and the drink had gone straight to my head. We hooked up with some of the Navy girls’ Army buddies.

When MaxBabe walked in, she got my attention straight away. Confident, a big grin on her face. She knew the Navy girls, and I assumed she was ADF too - in fact, I assumed she was an Army girl. I don’t know why. Just something about her. She said hello to me briefly then wandered off to spend time with the Navy girls.

She vanished after a while, so I decided to take my leave. Just as I was reaching my car, I saw her with a friend of hers. They were coming from the direction of an alcove often used by people doing drug deals. I felt my heart drop as I assumed she’d gone there to get a hit of something. She asked me if I was leaving, and I said yes. She begged me to stay, but I didn’t want to spend time with a dope-head, plus I was tired… so I went home (for the record, it turns out she’s not a dopehead. They’d just managed to park their car nearby to that alcove).

A month or so later, I went out with mates. I’d had quite a few. Someone tapped me on the shoulder. This girl grinned at me and asked me how I was. I had no idea who she was. “Remember me? From the Wick?”. Err, no. She gave me the tried and true, “Can I get you a drink?”. I didn’t recognise it as a line, and took it at face value. I pointed at my full drink and thanked her before refusing. She wandered off. She later told me she was feeling very dejected that I didn’t recognise her.

Later that night, I pointed her out to a friend. “She is HOT HOT HOT!”. My friend smiled and nodded in agreeance. Finally, we went over to the pool tables. MaxBabe was bent over the table, taking a shot. We perved on her hot butt for a while, then finally she looked up and noticed me. She sauntered over, exuding that confidence that had attracted me in the first place. We flirted, danced, flirted more, then finally kissed. Oh boy, what a kiss!

I dragged her out of there and we headed over to her place. I know it’s not exactly the most romantic story out there… but it’s our story!

We’ve been together for about 18 months. We’re not into “marriage” as such (even if gay marriage was an option), but around 6 months ago, I asked her to marry me. She looked at me cynically, and said “That depends. Do you mean you want to do that wedding shit?”. I said, “No honey, I don’t want to do that wedding shit. But I do want to do the spending the rest of my life with you shit”. She said “Me too!”. And that was that :smiley:
Max.

I had just downloaded ICQ and was sending out IM’s at random and striking up conversations. My habit was to enter a first name in the white pages and take it from there. I chose my wifes first name out of the blue and got a list of 50 ICQ users currently online with that first name. I said Hello…and she answered back. It was totally random…but we ended up talking for seven months. The more we talked, the more we realized how much alike we were. When we met for the first time, we were totally comfortable with each other. That was five years ago. We have been married for four of those and have two children.

I met Mrs.Top at work. I was the head of shipping and she was one of the annoying order pickers giving my department too much work. Shipping and Picking took breaks together and she quickly became one of the gang. At the time, she had a long distance relationship and my girlfriend was in jail (don’t ask, please). We went out a few times with other coworkers, just after work to the bar type stuff. One day, we were talking about movies and she offered to bring over a couple I hadn’t seen. Like an idiot, I thought it was just going to be a couple of friends watching movies, until halfway through Clockwork Orange, when she assaulted me(in a good way.) Until then, I was attracted to her, but I never really tried anything because of the age difference (I was twenty-seven, she was nineteen) Eight years, two kids, and three job related moves later, We’re just as happy as the day we moved in together.

btw, We still haven’t been able to get to the end of Clockwork Orange. Does it end the same as the book? :smiley:

Peace - DESK

What’s the 13th step?

When I started working in a finance department, a certain very pretty lady was working in the cubicle in front of me. I was obviously attracted to her but I did not believe in work place romances. They usually end badly. I was told by the yenta next to me that my other co-worker liked me. (I know it sound high school, I swear we were adults :smiley: ) I let her know that I was not interested. This woman was beloved by all the women in the place. If I went out with her and it went badly I would be ostracized. I would have to quit and find another job. I’m not exagerating. My co-worker even called me up and asked me out. I turned her down.

Fast forward several weeks. We all go out to shoot pool after work. I am spending most of my time with her. We wind up going to another bar by ourselves. Maybe the alcohol made me forget the logic of my arguments against us going out. We started dating that night. We went out for five years. Five years ago we got married. We have two monsterous (but lovely) daughters along with her son from a previous relationship.

I knew from the moment I saw her that I was attracted to her and I liked her from the beginning. I may be too logical for love at first sight. I did love her from early on but I am not one to jump into marriage quickly. Mrs loach says she knew I was the one from the minute she saw me (or soon thereafter). If you saw me you would think"Why?" I have no idea but I’m not going to question it. Before there was even a hint of us going out together, she broke up with the guy she was engaged with because of her feelings for me. Yes I have that power over women. Actually, just this once so it must be fate. Like I said, we’ve been together for ten years now and she has stuck by me through some tough times including this one. I have no idea how I got this lucky.

January 1972. My college had an independent activities period, where you got to stay at school and take (ungraded) seminars. I knew two ladies L1 (who had a crush on me, but who I wasn’t interested in) and L2, who I had pseudo-gone out with the summer before because we were both from New York, and who I was slightly attracted to, but not much (and it wasn’t mutual.) L2 was playing viola in a production of Yeomen of the Guard, and convinced me to take L1 there. (They were friends also.) Meanwhile L2 was being visited by the future Mrs. Voyager. We were partners in bridge, and were in a big group going to see the sunrise at Nahant. She had gone to band camp with L2 when they were in junior high. She dropped into my room while I was recording rare tapes off of WBCN. When I discovered that L2 was trying to get her to go see the operetta (to build up attendance more than anything) I invited her to go ice skating, something I had just learned to do. This involved borrowing skates for both of us, and borrowing an athletic card. So we went her last night in Boston, and I pretended to trip so she would grab my hand. It worked. :slight_smile: We spent the rest of the night together (nothing much happening) until I took her to the bus station at 3 am to go home. We wrote to each other, and I visited her a month later, and we had a torrid (if remote) relationship for a year. Then we broke up. For the next four and a half years we saw each other very infrequently until we got engaged, due to circumstances even more bizarre. We’ve been married for 26 years. I’m not sure it was love at first sight, actually, but more that we could never really stand to not be in contact, even though we never lived closer than 600 miles apart until we got married.

Oh, we still see L2, and I got the best of the deal.

I met shE. Thorp almost 9 years ago when she took a class I was teaching. (No snickering from the back row…she **earned **that A!) After the semester was over I moved to Seattle (from Pennsylvania) but we kept in touch, mainly by email with the odd paper letter or phone call. Nothing romantic at this point, but fate knows better, and I invited her for a “friendly” visit to Seattle. In May of 1997, she came for a 5-day visit and never left. We immediately shacked up without ever having properly “dated.” It was a bit odd, on day 2 or so, to realize I was looking at my wife, but there you have it. We were married in May 2001, and all is right with the world.

I broke up with my boyfriend of five years in August of 1980 and having nothing better to do, I dated a guy we knew (platonicly) for the next several months. He was okay but there just wasn’t enough spark to take it further. Interm Boyfriend started working at the local bottle depot and began talking about a particular co-worker. Seems the guy played guitar, as did I, and he figured I might be able to learn some stuff from him.

One night (November 20, to be exact) I.B. called me up and said he, the co-worker and the co-worker’s friend (the female half of the couple whose basement he rented - hubby stayed home with the kid) were going into Vancouver to go bar-hopping. Did I want to come?

Well, sure! I slapped on some makeup and shortly after they picked me up. I.B. was drunk. I mean totalled. Passing out pissed. Matter of fact, he didn’t even make it into the bar. We left him out in the car and went in anyway. If you know Vancouver, you might know the old Grand Union. It’s right on Hastings, about two blocks west of Main. It’s a horrible area now and it was just about as bad then. The bar itself is…um…well, indescribable, I guess. They did, however, have a live band. Co-worker had a chat with them and ended up sitting in for a couple of songs. I remember “Green, Green Grass of Home” being one of them. Hey, it was almost new, then! I thought co-worker had a good voice and his playing wasn’t half bad. He took off for the Men’s shortly after and came back with an old buddy in tow. Buddy ended up talking to Female Friend for the rest of the evening and Co-worker and I got nicely aquanted. We eventually toddled out to the car and started for home. Interm boyfriend was still out cold in the backseat. A few blocks later, at a stoplight, he suddenly sat bolt upright and said"Were am I? I have to go home!" Before we could stop him, he opened the door, jumped out and disappeared. We circled around for a while but we never did find him and finally headed home. To this day I have no idea where he went and when I asked him, he didn’t either!

At the time I was still living at home, on Sixth Street, between Tenth and Eleventh Avenue in Burnaby. Co-worker, it turned out, lived three blocks up, second house in at Sixth and Fourteenth! I stopped at his place for a few minutes, met F.F’s hubby and walked home.

Two days later, who should show up on my doorstep? We went to visit a friend of his. Turned out the friend played guiter too and I listened to the two of them jam all evening, sometimes taking a turn myself. It was a lot of fun. Several nights later, November 28 if you’re keeping count, he showed up again. We went out to the same friend’s place and then came back to my place, where we sat on the windowsill at the side of the house for a while and I explained that I wasn’t into casual sex but it was obvious that it was going to happen eventually between us. We knew we were attracted to each other, right? I just wanted to sort a couple of things out first. I’d been active with my ex, but that was five months ago. Etc,etc.etc.

Then we went up to his place and straight to bed. :smiley:

At some point in the proceedings (BTW, never make love in a room containing both a puppy and a kitten! ), I looked at him and though “Oh, no! This is him! That’s it, then.” Yep, I knew alright.

By Christmas we’d moved in with his really cool sister and shortly after went off to Edmonton together for five months. It’s been pretty rocky at times, but it looks like we’re stuck with each other. :wink: We’ve survived separations, financial trouble and the loss of a child. On the plus side, we can be totally goofy together and he still makes me glad I ignored the “etc’s” . We’ve also got two sons, fifteen and eighteen. Cool kids, think I’ll keep 'em :wink: