My best friend is getting married today. I'm all verklempt and weepy. We've been friends since our first year of college, and she's marrying a lovely guy. Awww.

I've commented on how me and pips met before, but reprinted for your pleasure:

"Well, me and Der Pipster met when we both worked at a bookstore in a suburban strip mall. I had been working there a year and ran the computer section. She was brand new. I was immediately dazzled by her smile and open, friendly manner and decided to chase her and with the help of my trusty butterfly net, we've been together ever since. Okay, kidding about that last part. There was a poet reading that night who was the father of a friend of hers or something and I stuck around to hear him, so we could go grab coffee at the diner afterwards. The poet had the same name as a 1960's baseball star who once said of astroturf "If a horse can't eat it, I don't want to play on it." I told the poet this and he seemed unimpressed.

Anyway, we went to the diner and had coffee and fries and we were instantly comfortable with eachother. Later that night, after driving around awhile, I kissed her. A month later she came by my parents house dangling keys to an apartment. and the rest is history. or quantum physics."

Come to think of it, the two women immediately previous to pips, I also met in bookstores. Bookstores are great for picking up chicks.

I posted mine in this MetaChat "Love Stories" thread.

Oh fuck I missed that. Obviously, seeing as I didn't post in it. Eh, move on then folks, nothing to see here...

*heads off to read Miko's thread*

*wishes she could stop bloody well double-posting, it's not as if she doesn't spend half her time on MeCha*

It was kind of a blind date - her mom had an idea she'd be my type and set us up to go for a walk in the park one Saturday. Sure enough, love at first sight. We spent all the time together I could manage, because I knew I'd have to be leaving in a few months. It seemed impossible she'd be able to come with me, so it was an intensely bittersweet time. But, some sequence of little miracles all turned out, and 10 years later here we still are together.

I met him at a Metafilter meetup in November 2005, at Revival. We briefly chatted, mostly at an after-meetup trip to a nearby diner. My first impression was, man, that guy is bitter about his recent breakup. We met up again at a meetup in May 2006... and the rest is history.

Are you going to the wedding, gaspode?

Well, it's in Sydney Australia in about... 12 hours. So I'm going with a "no".

(sucks in every way to not be able to go, but they were here in NYC about 6 weeks ago, so at least I got to see 'em)

Well, it's in Sydney Australia in about... 12 hours. So I'm going with a "no".

what? I think the A train stops in Sydney.

Yeah, but I'd have to transfer from the 2 at Times Square and you know I don't wanna be in that crowd...

Yeah, but the Sydney station is at least 5 stops before Far Rockaway, so it shouldn't be too bad...

Ms. Steady and I were High School sweethearts. She moved to my town in Senior year, and I still remember the first time I ever saw her. She walked into one of my classes, and I said to my friend, "Who is THAT?" My friend told me she was some new girl and that she was a cheerleader (which was not a positive thing to my friends). Later that week she sat down next to some acquaintances of mine, and I took the opportunity to sit by her and strike up a conversation. We were sort of friendly acquaintance for a few weeks when, emboldened by friends, I asked her if she wanted to go ice skating sometime. She did, we did, and despite the fact that I resemble nothing so much as a newborn moose on ice (and she is more Olympic-medallist-esque), she fell for me, I for her and here we are twelve years later.

Yes, folks, the long-haired freak and the cheerleader fell in love. (She's going to kill me when she finds out I put that on Flickr...)

He met me at a bus stop, bummed a cigarette, and commented on the book I was reading. We met further times at various stops, always talked about books, and then discovered we lived catty-corner to one another.

One day, he hopped the fence and crawled through the bedroom window. It's been like that for 12 years now.

newborn moose on ice

Coincidentally, this is the dinner special at Bobby Flay's Mesa Grille today.

On Metachat, man! Doesn't everybody? ;)

Seriously, though, what got Miko and I together for me was her incredible way with words. I fell in love with her communication skills before anything else.

I mailed myself to someone, but was delivered to the wrong address and it just happened to be LunaticFringe who opened the box. I imprint like a duckling.

Here's mine, also in the previous thread.

In second grade a new boy came to our class. He talked kind of funny and was from like 5 whole hours away from here- exotic Virginia! I was the only A and he was the first B so he spent years looking at the back of my head. He was moved away from me, without fail, by the third week of homeroom each year.

I grew up watching him crack up a room full of people on a regular basis and he still does it all the time... babies, his spanish speaking friends, the elderly, coworkers... we're like Howie Mandel and Morticia Addams.

No one loves you like your mother but he is my family. Every day I feel I have to... earn this because he's been the one true constant in my life.

We met within 24 hours of me arriving in the United States. Our running joke is that he was trawling the airport for recent immigrants.

I had just come out of a very long term relationship and then a slightly disastrous fling, so was arriving in the US with not much thought of meeting someone. In fact it was my specific intention to have as much meaningless sex as I could.

I went to work the morning after my arrival to start all my paperwork. It happened to be a Friday, and therefore we had happy hour. The grad students and fellow post-docs were grilling me about what I liked to do outside of the lab, and I mentioned that I love live music and asked about the local music scene. They said "you want to talk to Steve about that" and pointed me in his direction. We chatted briefly and he went off to band practice.

The next week at happy hour I chatted with him again - we talked about music and The Young Ones. We made a date for sushi and punk rock music. We went out to a bar with the students and I set someone's hair on fire. I overheard 2 girls talking about how Steve liked "kiwi" (surprise: I was there for a whole week before I got nicknamed). That surprised me because I hadn't thought of us as anything but friends. We went out a few times and saw music. Then one day I looked at him and realised that I'd fallen for him.

So much for all the meaningless sex.

We met within 24 hours of me arriving in the United States. Our running joke is that he was trawling the airport for recent immigrants.

If he had gone to a different gate he might've wound up married to Borat.

I haven't met him yet and there are times when I am pretty sure that that boat has long since sailed.

I've writing something called "Big Ten".
It's basically just an autobiographical tale that describes the best of the best girls I've ever dated/got engaged to/had a relationship with.

So here's a part of what I call "#4 - The T.V. Star"
Hope you guys dig it and please excuse the typos once again. CHEERS!


The T.V. Star (1991)

The producer of the Fox News show that I worked on sent me to my first industry party. It was the 1st. Anniversary of the Terry Williams Agency which pretty much handled the careers of just about every Black celebrity who was worth mentioning during that time (Eddie Murphy, Mike Tyson, Jasmine Guy, etc.). I took my cousin Judy to the party with me. I was supposed to be recruiting talent for our Mother's Day show, but got caught up like a country boy on his first visit to New York. My cousin Judy kept me focused though. Later into the night, everyone hit the dance floor. I had a Heineken in hand and was dancin with this girl whose face I didn't really see because she was so short. So my eyes stayed focused on her feet and the the occasional glance at her amazing cleavage. Turns out that she was a budding celebrity that the Williams Agency had just picked up. I won't say her name out of respect, but she did have recurring role on the biggest sitcom. Judy ended up chatting with her for about half an hour after sweating to the music. She brought her over to me while I was pretending to be talking to Fab 5 Freddy in hopes of impressing some other girl (whose face I can't remember). It's when I saw her. the "star", walk over that I realized who I was just dancing with. Turns out Judy did my dirty work by telling her who I was and where I worked and about the Mother's Day Show.
The "star" took us to meet her manager who was actually her mom (a semi-famous stand-up comedienne back then). Her mom, skeptical at first, gave me the green light and I ended up chillin with the "star" and my cousin all night. We exchanged numbers. A month later she called me. We planned a night out... Dinner and the Def Jam Christmas Party. That night was probably one of the best nights of my life. One of the more prolific of my many "15 minutes". Here I am...regular Joe from Brooklyn...cute lil TV chick on my arm. Cameras flashing (one picture ended up in Word Up magazine with the caption reading "unidentified companion" to describe me), getting that "you better take care of her" look from Denzel Washington when she took me to meet him....in fact, I kinda got that look from a lot of other cats too....Devante, Parish Smith,.....even M.C. Search. Anyway to make this a short one, it turns out that I was just the middle of the road man until she got back with her regular boyfriend who just happened to be one of America's biggest TV stars. It was fun while it lasted and I'll never forget it. The "star" passed away about three years ago...way before her prime.

DCA the old terminal. He was late; I needed a cigarette. I was wearing those Lacers that never quite fit properly and he was wearing a jacket his sister picked out for him.

Recently, I was in the old terminal, being quizzed down by security guys about Gibby Hayes and I was all misty-eyed at the rounded concrete walls. I wonder if they'd let us have our 15th anniversary party there.

Episode 1: At a party at my fraternity, I spied a cutie who filled out her fuzzy sweater nicely and had some pretty blue eyes and a nice smile :) I think I said hi, but didn't get a chance to talk to her much more than that.

Episode 2: The girl we called "The Load" came to our fraternity to bring cookies to her latest targets. Basically, The Load would stalk each of the members of our fraternity serially, hoping one would date her. At this point, her latest victims had no interst in dating her, but they had no problem eating her cookies.

She came up to the fraternity with an acquaintence of hers from the girls college downtown, but at the fraternity house The Load asked her to wait down at the bottom of the stairs while she stalked her victims.

So there's The Load's friend waiting at the bottom of the stairs. I notice her and ask her why she's hanging around, recognizing her as the girl from the party a couple weeks ago. We chat a little, then The Load comes down the stairs. The cookies are gone and she has been dismissed. So once again, Cutie Blue Eyes slips away.

Episode 3: As the holidays approach, the former victims of The Load decide to exploit their connection to the girls college to line up some Christmas presents for the annual fraternity Christmas party. They set up a get together to arrange to get two girls as "presents" for the president of the fraternity and also for the house nerd (who would never have a chance getting a girl by any other means).

So we go down the the girls college and meet The Load and several of her friends to arrange the presents. I finally get a chance to talk to Cutie Blue Eyes for a while. Yeah, that's right... talk. That's pretty much all we did that night.

Episode 4: The night of the party arrives, and the girls as presents are a big hit (especially the one who wore the leather pants). I end up spending most of the evening with Cutie Blue Eyes (okay, she stayed the night). We got engaged the following October and got married the August after that. That was 22 years ago. :)

So I guess I was the one who got the girl for Christmas that year.

I haven't met him yet and there are times when I am pretty sure that that boat has long since sailed.

So, you desire a fling with a sailor is what you're saying?

with the caption reading "unidentified companion" to describe me)

I get that a lot too, but it's usually in government files.

Aw, I liked Doohickie's story.

On MySpace. I wasn't interested in dating anyone because I'd just gotten out of a horrible long-term relationship a month earlier. But I was making new friends on MySpace. The one who became my boyfriend blew me away within the first 15 minutes of our meeting. We hung out a few times over a two-week period before anything came of it, though, because I thought I wasn't ready for a relationship. He called me every night after we first met, so I kind of suspected that he liked me, but he was kind enough to give me space too. Sweet.

Wolfdaddy, you still don't use the door? That's sooo romantic - I love it!!!

We met at the mailboxes. I liked the pink streak in her black punk hair; she liked the Yngwie Malmsteen tape blaring from my '86 blue Cavalier Z24 (the good one).

My apartment building was across the parking lot from her apartment building. She and her husband at the time were arguing (iow, screaming at the top of their lungs) outside. He stormed inside and locked her out. She pounded on the door to make him let her in, but he ignored her.

She put her fist through the living room window and grabbed her purse. She had sliced her arm up but not enough to need stitches. She stormed across the parking lot and knocked on my door. She never left.

...until 8 years later, when we screamed at each other in the street and then I locked her out. heheh

Seriously, though, what got Miko and I together for me was her incredible way with words. I fell in love with her communication skills before anything else.

It was like this for me, with George. We met in an online forum, and I loved his way with words and his sense of humour. I got an idea of who he was from what he wrote to the list, and one day he wrote privately to me about something I'd posted.

Over the next couple of years we began corresponding on pretty much a daily basis, then talking on the phone once or twice a week. Then I had to go into hospital for a big operation. George offered me one of his rental cabins (part of his land is turned over to 'tourist farming' - campgrounds and log cabins he built himself) when I was well enough to travel.

I went over on 15 May 2004. Right from the start, it felt as if we'd known one another forever. He took me to dinner, and I remember he kept smiling across the table at me, saying "you're so pretty, you're so pretty". I'm not, but he made me feel as if I was Miss Universe.

I stayed one night in the log cabin, then became a shameless hussy.

Now George is gone, I feel, as mygothlaundry says, that the boat has sailed for me and I won't find another life partner.

I've writing something called "Big Ten".
It's basically just an autobiographical tale that describes the best of the best girls I've ever dated/got engaged to/had a relationship with.

Interesting concept. I'd have trouble even recalling ten women I could write something like that about. I'd have to include relationships I fantasized about but never occurred to get to ten.

The only lover I've ever had is Mrs. Doohickie, and I had only had brief flings (of a nonsexual nature) prior to meeting her.

(Long time lurker, but with a good story)
It was my birthday, in 2000. I was on the blue line subway in Sao Paulo, heading south. Now, normally, I had taken the blue line north after work to go home, but being that it was my birthday, I was heading south with my friend and co-worker, to her house, so I could get my birthday present. Now, both my friend and I are American, and would occasionally draw looks on the subway for speaking in English. Apparently, that day, we drew some extra special attention, from my future husband.
As we left the subway car, he followed us off, and the next thing I know, we were approached by an exceedingly tall man, who spoke to us in perfect American English. I was less astonished by the fact that he was another American, and blown away by how tall and handsome he was (is). We exchanged email addresses (I didn't have a phone at the time, pre-privatization, you see), and the rest is history.
The best part? The subway station where he approached me is named "Paraiso", which in English means "Paradise", or "Heaven". *sigh*
(resumes lurking)

I'm not, but he made me feel as if I was Miss Universe.

Aw, don't lie, I've seen pics and you *are* so pretty.

From my point of view, I enjoyed LT as a light and fluffy humorous character on this site, but didn't take him all that seriously until we began to hang out in IRC chat at length in a mild and friendly way, sharing all kinds of perspective, stories, background, and laughs. I started to build a strong sense of his intelligence, depth, and warmth. We were always saying the same thing at the same time - verbatim - an event which continues even in real life.

After I realized that my daily two-to-four-hour chat conversation with him was becoming the highlight of my day, keeping me up far to late, we went to the lengthy phone conversation, the lengthy letter-writing, and the large bulky parcel-mailing. One major leap of faith later, here we are. So far so good!

I think LT is getting the better part of that deal.... ;-)

This isn't mine, but I've always liked this one. It's so... Suburbia/Repo Man sorta thing.

"I was 15. She was punk. D.R.I. was playing "Dead in a Ditch" and our friends were waiting for us in a nearby park (we went out to get the cold malt liquor). As we bonded in the backseat of her Honda, I told her I loved her. She said "don't ruin it".
-mantid@morphine.neuron.net"

Though it didn't last, I've 'met cute' once.

In 2002, I started working at this company and one of the women in my department took it upon herself to help with my training. On my second day there, I was sitting outside and she came in wearing a 60's style A-line dress and I was floored.
Julia was 28, seven years younger than me, 5'10" with long legs and beautiful hands. She looked a lot like Molly Ringwald with blue eyes and a reverse bob haircut.
I thought she was perfect. She knew all the words to Van Halen I and dressed cool. I asked her to come to a DJ event, she did and we danced together and I introduced her to my friends. When we hugged goodnight, it was electric!
I was convinced I had no chance.
A short time later, my birthday came around and Julia baked me a cake and made me a card. Semi-joking, I told her I'd say good things about her in my weblog.
The next day I came into work and could tell something had changed. Compelled by forces I did not understand, I asked her out to lunch and she said that she wanted to talk to me. She led me WAY out into the woods behind our office park as we chatted about her sick grandmother. We eventually came to a big rock under a Willow tree. Julia sat down.
I noticed she was looking at me oddly, like she was seeing me for the first time. I remember her clothes were bright red. I started to get nervous.
After a while, she casually informed me that she'd seen my weblog. She'd asked one of the guys at work to help her find it.
That took a couple of seconds to sink in. I remember asking her, "Waitaminute, you saw my weblog and you came out here with me?"
She nodded. "Yeah..."
That took a couple of more seconds to sink in. She stared at me expectantly with her shiny blue eyes.
"So...you're not mad?" I asked.
"Nope. Acutally, you could say it really helped your case!"
As we walked back to work, she told me about a dream she had about me the night before.
I cranked "The Luckiest Guy On The Lower East Side" when I got back to my desk, knowing she'd know what it meant.
The next day we had our first phone conversation.

Two days after that we hugged in the elevator leaving work.

The day after that..? Well...

For clarification on my last comment, D.R.I. were playing "Dead in a Ditch". It's a punk thing.

I gave up looking; not everyone is destined for a comfortable life in some sort of partnership, it seems. I don't really understand how people can put up with someone else for long enough to actually discuss marriage and home ownership or whatever.

Two weeks after I broke up with my last boyfriend, my mother died. In the midst of grief and rage, I set myself a six-month-minimum hibernation period (I was not even allowed to *think* about dating) and retreated into isolation to regroup.

I was going to therapy, and right at the end of that six months it had gotten to the point where it felt right to end that -- I felt like I finally had the tools I needed to get myself through my life on my own for a while. I walked out of that last session feeling strong, and calm, and together for the first time in a long time.

There was a MetaFilter meet-up that evening, which I went straight to. My first meet-up, and it was very fun. Later on a guy showed up wearing a leather jacket, and he introduced himself, and I recognized his username as the doctor who usually posted interesting, thoughtful things, so I suspect the first thing I said to him was "Oh, you're the MD!" which came out as more ego-stroking than I perhaps intended. He said he was a neurologist, and the other person sitting there started talking about strokes, which was good because up until that point I probably couldn't have told you what part of the body a neurologist doctored.

Then he asked me what I did for a living, and I smiled a bit because it was such an East Coast question, but we talked about travel for a while (which has always been a nice side effect of being in the travel business). And I found out he was reasonably new to SF, so I forgave the job question.

Then he and I started talking about hiking, and I made very girl-appropriate open-ended remarks about "how that sounds great!" and "it's great you have a car and can do that; it's my one regret about not having a car." But after a while he said he had to get home, and he left without getting my number, so I wrote it off as a pleasant flirtation and nothing more.

I did keep checking my email, but nothing for a few days. Then I got an email at my work address, which I thought I'd never given out, from ikkyu2, asking if I wanted to go hiking and apologizing for some drama in MetaTalk.

I go to MeTa. He had started a MetaTalk thread to track me down, because the emails he had tried to send to my listed address had not gone through. Poor man put himself up before the vultures and snarkers in MeTa to find me. matteo, I believe, accused him of stalking me; others made similarly "leave the poor girl alone" comments. He maintained good humor throughout, and to some extent I was impressed by someone who would be that public in such a generally-not-nice forum about wanting to find me, and put himself on the line in that way.

We've been together a little over a year at this point (though we do still argue about the date, since I count from our first, you know, date and he seems to do some weird retroactive algorithm that has us dating from the moment we met).

Sigh...this got a bit long, but all the details are important to me....

One Monday morning 4 1/2 years ago, I was feeling really bitter about just having broken up with a woman. I was cynically scanning the personals in our local alterna-paper, the Washington CityPaper, and, totally on a lark, entered an ad:

Every time you answer someone else's personal ad, God kills a kitten. Tall urban hipster urges you to please, think of the kittens.

That was it--nothing about how I looked or where I lived or what sort of job I had. Well, it was a hit, got ad-of-the-week, special placement in the paper that Thursday, free theater tickets, and a whole-freaking-bunch of responses.

I exchanged a few emails with one of the respondents, and it turned out we were both going to see the local premiere of the Ron Jeremy biopic that weekend. She saw me there, but I was with another woman (a friend, I swear), so she didn’t say anything. The following Monday was unseasonably warm, so breaking all dating rules, I asked her out with about 3 hours notice. She said yes!

We met at a cheapo little outdoor Greek place, and I was floored when I saw her. We had dinner, then wandered around Dupont Circle for hours. I knew it was going well when she offered me a lick of her ice cream.

There was a nice good-night kiss on her front steps, then the date was over. When I got home, she’d already left a message on my answering machine telling me what a good time she’d had. We went out again that Friday, spending the whole weekend together, exchanging the “L” word by Sunday.

Oh, it was during that weekend that I bought her a ring from a vending machine, you know, a 50-cent thing that was sure to turn her finger green, just as a cute little gesture. She wore it constantly after that, on her right ring finger. When she forgot it at my place once, I took it to a jeweller, and had it re-cast in silver ($85), and gave it to her for our three-month anniversary. She thought that was pretty neat, to say the least.

On our one-year anniversary, I said, sort of casually, "How would you feel about wearing that ring on your other hand?" Sweet, huh? She now wears it as her wedding ring.

Damn, Doohickie - if you're still upset over that fling, see someone about it. I liked what we shared together, and I didn't even bitch when you brought your nasty old Cheetos fingers to bed.

Oh, speaking of Meta-related meetings, I helped arrange, and attended, the Metafilter meetup at which NortonDC and onlyconnect met, and then had the great honor to be in their wedding.

Mr Moonpie and Doohickie are tied now!

Yay for unlurking, msali! Nice story!

I met mr. taz some time after he moved in next door to a friend of mine... all my female friends were buzzing and breathless about how gorgeous he was. I was a) married and b) not really that interested in gorgeous guys anyway (kind of a reverse discrimination thing). I met the girl he was dating, and was doubleplus not impressed - psycho model type. I didn't know this, but after he met me, he kept asking my friend, his neighbor, about me (they also became best friends) - like all the time. We kind of travelled in the same crowd, would see each other at the same clubs and parties; he was always surrounded by a clutch of eager women, but he would always extricate himself when he saw me, and come talk to me.

Somewhere along the line, I almost sublet his apartment for a summer when he was going to be in Greece, because I was leaving my husband, but my husband talked me into staying, so that didn't happen. However, a year later, I was leaving again, and I was wandering around the French Quarter, checking out "for rent" signs, and looking up a lot, because I wanted a place with a balcony. I didn't even realize I was on his street, but there he was, standing on his balcony, waving me to come up, so I did. And we sat on that balcony for the rest of the day and talked and laughed non-stop, and drank three bottles of red wine; it was really amazing, in a way I can't quite describe - like we had known each other in another life or something, I swear, but forgotten everything and had to catch up.

That night I had to attend a semi-formal event - work related, and I couldn't invite him, because it was press party type of thing, yet he said he would pick me up and drive me there... I told him I was going with a mutual friend of ours who worked with me - and he said he'd pick her up, too. And when it was over, he came and picked us up afterwards, and we all went out (my friend turned 25 shades of green). Anyway, I ended up moving in with him, and all my women friends hated my guts, and we're still together 16 years later (and I think they still hate my guts).

all my female friends were buzzing and breathless about how gorgeous he was

should have been: "all my female friends (and half my men friends)"

Wow, occhiblu, that's a great story! So many MeCouples!

My SO and I lived in the same dorm freshman year in college - just down a flight of stairs and at the end of the hall. My friend had started dating his roommate a week into our first semester, so I hung out with him a lot while he was constantly "sexiled." SO and I started hanging out more, and I got a little crush on him - I thought he was out of my league, he was a football player and a pretty heavy partier, a college scene I was only just getting into. I was seeing someone else at the time, but that ended when it turned out he was batshit insane. After the breakup, I was pretty down for awhile, and SO and I started drinking together pretty heavily. We tried to "quit together" - he claims I lost because I took a sip of beer right before he did. My friends started making little pointed comments, and rolling their eyes whenever we went to the coffee shop together.

One night, I went to his room (while he was doing homework) and asked him to kiss me. That was four years ago, last Saturday. I can't imagine getting through college and the subsequent move without him.

ikkyu2's MetaTalk thread to track down occhiblu

This is a great thread.

the ikkyu2/occhiblu story is an absolute classic with the metatalk thread... that's hilarious! God, I love it.

i met the love of my life in college...but i was too much of a closet case to give it a chance. i pretended instead that i hated her. after our marriages to men failed (surprise) we were reaquainted via the internet. we were fated...and i dont even think i believe in that stuff...we told each other our life stories, both of which included the girl from college that we didn't take a chance on. of course, we were talking about each other.
we figured out who the other was...which was very funny. putting 2 and 2 together, she emailed and said "i think we have a problem." at that point, i still did not realize that she felt for me what i felt for her in college. after talking on the phone all night, we ended up fessing up, feeling fooling and decided to meet in person. i think women in their 30s (which we both were/are) are women in their prime. i could not believe how much more beautiful she looked when i first saw her...a little older, a little heavier, a little wiser...but something about a woman in her 30s just looks Finished. and something about this particular woman has affected me like No Other person ever has. still does.
ahh...sappiness.

Damn, Doohickie - if you're still upset over that fling, see someone about it. I liked what we shared together, and I didn't even bitch when you brought your nasty old Cheetos fingers to bed.

*clicks tongue*
Well! You're such a drama king!

I meant no disrespect to you; I was merely admiring the "intelligence, depth, and warmth" in Miko that she cites as admirable qualities in you. In fact in writing this, I realize you and Miko make a good pair!

...but something about a woman in her 30s just looks Finished.

Wait a while and you'll get an even better idea about what a Finished woman is. Mrs. Doohickie is all that and more, and I think she's only getting better. I suppose you will observe the same with your sweetie.

;- )

Oh, and gaspode: Thanks for not searching for doubles. This has been a wonderful thread.

*has warm fuzzies*

ahh...doohickie, i can't wait to see :)

dh, thanks for your nice comments, and how nice to read nice things about Mrs D, too, and everyone else's sweeties.

There is something so fantastic about people who speak proudly of their SOs. It always seems so disturbing when people bitch and complain about their relationships, or run their partner down ('he's a lazy slob
, 'my wife is a loudmouth,' etc.) Sometimes that might be part of a witty dynamic of some sort, but more often it's just depressing. The happiest couples I know seem to hold each other up more than put each other down.

I had been going out with this girl for about four years or so when she unceremoniously dumped me. My friends had all hated her so they were secretly glad. They decided that one of our extended set of acquaintances was the perfect girl for me although we hardly knew each other (she had even called me by the wrong name once).

Job one was to convince me that we would like to go out with me. It didn't take much, I was pretty lonely. They only told her that I was going to ask her out. It wasn't difficult, since we all worked at the same company and I was able to run into her in the hallway (I hate using the phone so I was spared that). I asked, she accepted.

After I picked her up, but before we got to dinner, I (a volunteer firefighter) got a call. I asked her if she'd mind if I went and she had no problem with that. It wasn't a serious call and we were back pretty quick. When she was still patiently waiting for me, I knew she was the one.

This will be our 24th Christmas together and we just celebrated our 23rd anniversary :)

Awww. *passes around the Kleenex box*

This runs long, you might want to get a beverage.

May 15, 1999 I bought a computer and went online for the first time. A couple days later I gathered up my courage to check out a chat-room (MSNs long (un)dead ComicChat). The #newbies room looked like a good bet and I nervously entered the room. The warm welcome was overwhelming. I quickly made new friends some of whom are friends to this day.

I'm not sure when I first started talking to this dude who went by the nick of Eli (I was RedFern, by the way). But by July we were playing Quake2 with a bunch of other chat buddies and I thoroughly enjoyed fragging his, and everyone else's, ass. We'd "whisper" back and forth to each other in #newbies and started having long conversations on ICQ. Four hour conversations. Along about September we exchanged phone numbers and the four hour conversations continued.

By the end of September we knew we wanted to meet, but let me digress a bit:

I had decided in Spring of 1999 that I would move to Seattle the following Spring. I had a dreadful vision of being in the same place (Texas) doing the same job (loan underwriter) for the same company (a S&L) 40 years down the line. It was horrifying.

Back to Eli and RedFern:

So, we wanted to meet but we didn't want to wait until Spring 2000. I checked with my brother in Seattle to see if I could move up my move date (I was going to stay with him while I got a job, an apartment, etc.) and he said he'd be glad to have me sooner. I gave notice to my employer saying that my last day would be just before Thanksgiving. That gave me almost a month to get packed and moved to Seattle by mid December (to fund all of this I cashed out my 401k).

I then had to get up the nerve to tell my mum that I had met this guy on the internets and was moving to Seattle. (FYI: we both worked for the same company and were based in their San Antonio location.) She took it better than I thought she would; mum's can surprise you.

My brother flew down (at my expense) to help me load up the UHaul truck I had rented and drive to Seattle. (It was nice to spend the time with my older bro. He's nine years older than me and moved to Seattle when I was in my mid-teens. We hadn't really gotten to know each other very well, but the year I lived with him was great.)

We arrived in Seattle on December 17 and Eli drove down from Canada on the 18th to help us unload the truck and get me set up at my bro's place. I was so nervous I truly thought I would throw up. He rang the doorbell and I answered and we stood there looking at each other like a couple half-wits. He finally came in and we kissed hello. I became a shameless hussy that night.

We commuted back and forth over the border for just under a year. We were both worn out emotionally from being apart so much and decided we wanted to live together in Canada. Well, Canadian Immigration said that it wasn't quite that easy and it would be easier if we got married. Neither of us were exactly in the marrying mood. Eli had been divorced less than a year (I wasn't exactly the rebound gal. He had a short, non-intimate, relationship in between his wife and myself. And that's a story in itself. My married brother got intimately involved with the same woman.). And I had decided long ago that I would never get married.

We were told this by CIC on Sunday and we were married the next Saturday (December 2). We didn't tell anyone and I don't think my mum or brother will ever forgive us for that.

I adore my mister and have yet to understand why someone like him would marry someone like me. I'm just lucky, I guess.

Wow. Great stories.

Ahem. Here's mine. Many many moons ago I was a wet behind the ears junior Art Director in Copenhagen, and I had just gotten a lease on a run-down apartment in the bad part of town. I had also just gotten a Danish BF. When I decided to paint that run-down apartment, him and his best friend helped me do so, and I recall that his friend kept cracking me up with his puns. So much so that I caught myself checking him out and noticing that he was cute to boot, apart from that silly long hair. A flickr of "drats, I'm already occupied" dashed through my head but I ignored it. I mean I was so much older and wiser than these kids anyway. By a full two years. ;)

Nine years later and three countries for me, the funny dude sent out a mass email declaring that he was done with his photography education and basically hit everyone he knew up for a job. He'd googled me up to add me to that CC-list. I dragged him down to Amsterdam for a job, and he spent a Friday night after a week of work being a good listener as I complained about my current BF-situ. I mentioned children. He replied "I'd be honored to father your children." I was sold right that instant and I knew it. He went home the next day and by the end of that next week I left for NYC.

I had to spend time away from him and my now ex-BF, for that famous time to think (just to be sure I wasn't rebounding on the guy), but staying three months in New York City partying every night just made me even more certain, he was going to father my children.

And now he has. And she's the kyootest thing ever. so there.

Well, I interviewed her for a job. After making sure that she got the job, I found that she was living with someone, so left things there. One night we both ended up at at the same table at a graduation evening (we worked at a College) and got talking. When a bunch of students asked us to go on after the dinner and have a few drinks, we accepted and, while we several times made comments along the lines of "we're just flirting, this is not going anywhere" (because of the live-in boyfriend, the fact that I was her boss, 12 years older than her and a single parent), the mutual attraction was obvious. We ended up sitting on a bench here and watching the sun come up. Eleven years and three kids later (all way cuter than dabitch's), here we are.

aaaaaw. We're gonna hafta go out and fight on that cute thing tho. ;)

I was fresh out of grad school and my boyfriend at the time had yet to graduate, so I stuck around teaching classes. A bunch of women in the department happened to have babies that year, so by a weird stroke of luck I got to teach a few plum courses. One of them was an Introduction to Poetry writing workshop. I had two sections, one at 9:30 and the other at 10:30.

There was a guy in the early section who I noticed immediately -- he had an unusual name that I thought was very evocative, like something out of a Flannery O'Connor story. He also had an air of intelligence and intensity that really stood out in that group. My later section was great, full of good writers and people and fantastic conversations, but everyone in the early section seemed to be dialing it in. Once the class really swung into gear, my early impressions were solidified, and my evocative student began turning in the work I really looked forward to reading, and that class basically became a conversation between us.

Later, my boyfriend and I began going out to see his band play. I remember he seemed surprised I bought and listened to his records. After the class concluded we all became friends, seeing each other at shows and occasionally hanging out. He went off to grad school himself, with a recommendation from me. We would occasionally go visit him. Then boyfriend and I broke up, and I took a job as an editor, buying a house and generally settling down. I didn't write poems anymore. I felt like that part of me was buried under ice.

Then my old friend moved back to town, and needed a job, so I helped him get one where I worked. After he broke up with his girlfriend, I started going to his little studio apartment a lot to cheer him up. On Christmas Eve, neither of us wanted to deal with travel and family, so we decided to spend it together. We ate at a horrible restaurant where our food didn't arrive for hours but we were so deep in conversation we didn't notice. Later that night, we cracked a bottle of champagne. When we woke up I had no idea what was going to happen. I had seen it coming, yet I couldn't believe when it actually arrived.

For a while it was like we lived in another world. We rarely saw other people or told anyone we were together. I think I got maybe four hours of sleep a night for nearly a year and never felt the lack. We spent every moment together, and at some point digging out our old poems and swapping them, then writing together. It was like I could physically feel the ice around my heart breaking.

Then there was music, and then there was marriage, and now there is life in a new city where I have to admit I am sometimes scared, because I haven't quite figured out how to live here yet. But wherever Hiram is, I am home.

He gave me a collage that he made when we were still friends, before I ever knew that I would be his wife and we would have our own household, that I had told him I loved. On it was written a piece by one of my favorite poets. Now it will always remind me of him:


Danse Russe

If I when my wife is sleeping
and the baby and Kathleen
are sleeping
and the sun is a flame-white disc
in silken mists
above shining trees,--
if I in my north room
dance naked, grotesquely
before my mirror
waving my shirt round my head
and singing softly to myself:
"I am lonely, lonely.
I was born to be lonely,
I am best so!"
If I admire my arms, my face,
my shoulders, flanks, buttocks
against the yellow drawn shades,--

Who shall say I am not
the happy genius of my household?

William Carlos Williams

Well these pulled me out of my crankiness and made me feel more positive about love. (The result of falling in love for me currently means getting kicked in the ribs regularly and having a list of things I can and cannot do or consume. Love can suck it.)

My story is here, for those who missed it.

Thinking about it, it's still bittersweet, all the time, because the time is ultimately so short.

There is something so fantastic about people who speak proudly of their SOs. It always seems so disturbing when people bitch and complain about their relationships, or run their partner down

Mrs. Doohickie is the worst housekeeper. EVAR. But she's the best little worst housekeeper I know.

:-P

My sweetie and I met on our first day of our new jobs (where we still work). He had just moved back to town the day before after taking some time in the country. It was an orientation day and we expected to be completely swarmed with registering students, and we were both nervous as hell. As it turned out, there as a server problem, so our day turned into apologizing to people for a while and then being sent home earlier than expected.

We had to make a trip to a different building across campus and it was pouring rain. I suggested taking the public transit bus and he claimed to not be aware of the routes and stops, as they'd changed while he was away. We ended up exchanging AIM and yahoo information ("No one uses phones anymore," I joked.).

We were both casually dating other people for a few months, but visited online and in person a lot. We had a standing Monday night "date" where he would come over and make dinner for me and my kids, so that I could have a break from it. We would hang out and play dominoes or Scrabble or watch movies. Being a single mom, I couldn't go out a lot and he's always been very comfortable in my home and terrific company. We became best friends and decided to give a relationship a try. That was 3 years ago.

We were engaged this past August. I look forward to getting old with him.

Awwww.... Nice story, lily.

Yesterday, upon a stair...

I still love my exwife, I just don't like her.

I still love my exwife, I just don't like her.

i still love my ex-husband...i was not happy married to him, but i am happy having him in my life.
he does love his children...i love him most for them...

http://eideteker.livejournal.com/439653.html