Depending on who you ask, and when you ask, you will get several conflicting answers to the “How did you guys meet?” question. Especially when people know I’m from Texas and Jeff is from Mississippi. We love to make up stories on the spot. One of my favorites that Jeff made up once was that I was a circus freak and he jumped the train and we fell in love. We get a lot of strange looks from that one. But the truth is, the way we met was very uneventful. Chance, or fate if you believe in that kind of thing, brought us together. You see, back in the day, we were both pretty big rock fanatics. We still are actually; both perpetually stuck in the 90′s. We love grunge rock, classic rock and blues music. It was that love for music that brought us together. Let me whisk you back to early 2000…the internet wasn’t widely used then as it is today. There were no eHarmonys….no Match.coms. I mention this because when I tell people we met online, that’s the first conclusion they jump to. But no, we weren’t looking for love. Heck, we weren’t looking for anything. We both just so happened to be in the same online music forum at the same time. In those days, if you were in a forum, you could instant message another forum user. I saw Jeff was online, saw his profile had a lot of similarities to mine. Once I read through some of his likes and dislikes I sent him a simple message.
“Deftones Rock!”
Jeff likes to kid and say that I hit on him…but in all honesty, I didn’t know him from Adam. I didn’t know how old he was, what he looked like. Nada. Zilch. I’m a very outgoing individual, and if I see someone in the grocery store buying the same OJ as I do, I’ll try to strike up a conversation. It’s my nature. I’m a talker. Er, in this case, typer. Next thing you know…we switched emails and phone numbers and *POOF* here we are today. We became amazing friends and shared things with each other for years. There was something about the distance, the mystery…that really tied us to each other. We talked on the phone for hours on end. Instant messaged until 5 in the morning a few times. Life, college and other romances took over our lives and got in the way…but here we are, 11 years later. Getting married.
It took us 8 years to decide to date. I look back on my life and it’s hard for me to imagine Jeff not being in it. I feel like he’s always been a part of me. Now I know he always will be. ♥