I think I know you

Today is a special day over here. Today, April 29, is Prince William and Kate’s 1 year anniversary!

More importantly though, today is Chris and my 1 year anniversary! Those jerks just decided to steal our thunder.

This is probably more for my sake than anyone else’s, but I’m going to tell Our Story. So cheesy, I know. I want to be able to look back on it as the years go by, and today seems as good a day as any to get it all down.  I’ll try and be brief, but know that is not my strong suit. If you can’t stand me gushing, then just skip the parts labeled CHEESE. I’ll do a running post again soon. I swear it.

The short story is the Chris and I met on Match.com in April 2011. That’s not the whole story though because we actually met for the first time in September 2006.

COMMENCE CHEESE

After graduating college and realizing that never going to bars meant I probably wouldn’t meet the love of my life in one, I decided to join Match. I had friends and family on Match and even knew a few married couples who’d met there, so I wasn’t really too nervous about it. Unfortunately, after a couple of months of searching, I started to get discouraged. To be fair, everyone I met was nice and normal, and I never had a bad date, but I also never clicked with anyone. I just never got that swoon feeling. I decided I was going to cancel my account and just take a break. The day I was ready to cancel, I saw an email that caught my eye.

The email was from Chris. It was short, sweet and clever, but what got my attention was the name. I knew his name. I just didn’t know how. So, I took to Facebook. We weren’t friends, but we did have a mutual friend. It just happened to be a guy I dated briefly in college. That clue helped me put the puzzle together. Not only did I know the name, I knew Chris.

We both went to Rutgers, and it turns out we’d met once, through that former boyfriend, when I was a sophomore and he was a senior. He’d had a house party and Chris and I were both there. The ex (then current) boyfriend had introduced me to Chris. The exact phrasing was, “You have to meet my big brother (fraternity, not real life– that’d be a very small world) Chris. He’s so cool. He plays guitar.” So, I did, and he was cool. Like dreamy, cool.

still is

We met. We spoke, and I remembered it 5 years later.

After confirming my recollection, I told my roommate, “I know this guy.” I explained it to her and asked her what I should do. She told me not to bring up anything related to our connection unless we made it to date 3 (the date when all the skeletons come out). She said it would just freak him out, and it didn’t really matter because he didn’t remember. That was her advice, but she was always full of bad advice anyway, and I can’t keep my mouth shut ever, so I ignored it.

From our first emails, I could not stop thinking about this guy. He was funny (it’s tough to be that funny in an email), smart and kind. He just seemed like a really good guy, and in my experience, those were hard to come by. Eventually, we started texting, and he was shaping up to be really wonderful. He never left me hanging, waiting for hours for a text and always responded with something sweet and thoughtful. He seemed like he cared about what I had to say (it’s tough to be that caring in a text). Mostly, he just seemed genuine, another hard quality to come by. I was hooked, so we set a date.

I had watched the royal wedding on the morning of our first date, so I guess I was already feeling a little romantic, but when date time rolled around, I almost didn’t go. In addition to feeling a little romantic, I was feeling a lot sick. I hadn’t slept well the night before, had taken a bunch of new allergy medicine (hot, I know) and really felt like I was going to pass out. I went back and forth in my head, but I couldn’t shake the image of super cool, super cute 2006 Chris from my head, plus, I was beginning to really fall for 2011 Chris from our texts and emails, and didn’t want him to get the wrong message by rescheduling the date last minute, so I went. On the walk there, I was so woozy that I had to stop and sit down for a minute, but I made it.

When I saw him outside the restaurant, I froze. I knew that I was feeling a bit funky, but this was different. My heart literally fluttered. I felt it skip two beats, and it took my breath away. Impossibly, he was even cuter than I remembered. He was just the most handsome guy I had ever seen in my life, and VELVEETA CHEESE ALERT, I am convinced it was love at *second* sight. I composed myself said hello.

We got a table, and I couldn’t stop staring into those big beautiful eyes. He was so kind and just as genuine as he’d seemed from the moment I met him that he immediately made me feel at ease.  It was almost too perfect. Don’t worry, I ruined it quickly by squirting myself in the eye with a lemon the minute my iced tea was delivered to the table. I tried to play it off because I’m super cool like that, but Chris totally called me out for it. It was awesome; he did it in a sweet way, but it was only date I’ve ever been on where even totally awkward moments didn’t seem awkward. I felt like I’d known this guy forever, and for the rest of the night, we talked and acted like friends, not strangers who’d just met.

I tried to absorb every detail of that night. I was so swept off my feet that I actually thought to myself, this might be my last first date ever, so I’d better enjoy it, and I did.

We talked a lot that night, and the way he spoke made me think that surely my friends and family had hired him and provided him with a script to keep me from giving up on dating forever. Everything I learned about him made me like him more. After dinner, we decided to walk. Maybe it was the unusually high comfort level, maybe I already knew he was the one, maybe it was the lemon juice making it’s way from my eye to my brain, but something caused me to tell him about our mutual friend. He was pretty shocked, and he told me he thought my name sounded very familiar too. I told him a few dates later about our meeting in college, and he was floored. It turns out he doesn’t remember that part, but I know it happened! We’ve since scoured old pictures for photographic evidence, but there is none.

We walked and talked a bit more, and then he took me home.

The second I got home I called my mom and told her I was head over heels (the exact phrase I used was, “I am so f*cked!”- I got in trouble for saying that. She’s still my mom, after all). I told her that I have never in my life felt as strongly for someone I just met as I did in that moment. I knew that if he wasn’t interested in me, I would have been genuinely crushed. This was so out of character for me (I’m a shrew, really) that my mom asked me how many drinks I’d had. I told her I was sober as death. I just knew. They say it, and it sounds made up, but when you know, you just know. Chris is my one.

I’d stand precariously on a ledge overlooking Chicago for him

The rest is history. He asked me to be his girlfriend several dates later. The night before he told me he loved me, I had a dream he said it to me. We moved in together last November, and we’ve lived happily ever after since.

Check out that sweet Rutgers ‘R’ ice sculpture 

It’s crazy to think that we went to school together for two years then went on to live in the same city for two more years before meeting. I imagine we sat next to each other on Rutgers’ buses and PATH trains. I think he’s probably held the door for me at an academic building or passed me on his bike as I ran through Liberty State Park. I know we met once, but we weren’t ready. There was a time when I wished we had figured it out back then and gotten together sooner. I thought of all the heartache we could have both avoided. Then I remember the person I was then and how I became the person I am now, and I’m reminded that everything happens for a reason. You will  find your one when you are meant to find that person. Any earlier is too soon.

Fred and Wilma got nothing on us

Still, I’m glad I didn’t have to wait too long. I can’t imagine what my life would be like without Chris. He is my best friend and the love of my life. He means more to me than he will probably ever know, and I love him more each day than I did the last.

END CHEESE

Thanks for bearing with me on that one. I know it was a bit over the top. I just can’t control myself when it comes to that boy. I promise it will be the last time I get all mushy on you. Don’t worry, I’m already back to being a shrew.