Marrying Your Sweetheart: The Meet The Couple Episode

As mentioned in my previous post, my honey and I have been together for a cool eight years. This is longer than most people I know have been married, and every day that passes that we don't strangle each other/throw a fit/accidentally kick each other in the face I count as a success. We're an unlikely pair if I've ever seen one, the cooking and animal loving Bio and English major with the sport obsessed, equally passionate and lazy cinema and television major somehow coexisting in relative harmony. I attribute our success to my love of cooking, his love of eating, and our mutual love of chocolate covered pretzels. But really, it's more like a weird system of give and take, lots of mistakes and our mutual love of arguing that's most likely to blame for our relationship (If I wasn't so set on being a doctor I could easily become a lawyer, just so I could be paid to debate are argue all day long). That and my cat liked him, which went a long way in his favor.

A Friend's Birthday Party, August 2004

While we've been dating for eight years, we've actually known each other since we were about 7 or 8. As a tomboy, I found his pillow fighting skills satisfactory, his tree climbing skills acceptable and most importantly his video gaming skills entertaining enough to merit an easy going friendship. His green/blue eyes, sandy blonde hair and baby chubby cheeks did nothing for me, the ultimate boy child, until we reached 15 and 16, something clicked and he turned on the charm.

In high school he was pursuing a career in film, absolutely convinced he would be the next famous director. He had written many mostly sport related scripts (I kinda hate sports), including a short feature that he asked me to play a part in. Despite my complete lack of interest in acting (or any acting skills for that matter) I agreed, and we spent a few days a week together that summer running around my house with his mini DV camera. Little did I know the film was more of an opportunity to get close to me, a fact I probably should have realized upon reading the repeated "kissing" scenes in the script between the dashing athlete and his bride. Add in a heavy dash teenage hormones, a pinch of attraction, stir counter clockwise with 2 cups of water, and BAM! Instant relationship.

Senior Portraits for High School, 2005

Somehow, we made it through going to different high schools on opposite sides of Los Angeles. I didn't drive but he did, so he used to drive over Tuesday nights since I didn't have class until 9am on Wednesday. We made it through going to two different colleges, pursuing wildly different career paths. He screwed up once when I first left for college, and while I've always taken a hard line of zero tolerance on cheating, I eventually forgave him (even if I wasn't able to forget his indiscretion). We grew up, made mistakes together and somehow our continuously changing goals and personalities continue to match up. My mother has this snarky saying she likes to throw around when we've done (or not done) something, "playing house". According to her, we've been playing house for 8 years, pretending at a relationship because two teenagers, then two twenty somethings, couldn't possibly have what it takes to make a relationship work.

Now, this time next year we will be married. I'm not sure if that will make our relationship any less "playing house" to my mother, but I'm excited to begin a new phase of our lives. I still don't like sports and he still isn't thrilled by my aquariums, but we still like to argue and together we somehow manage to make it work. I can't imagine being with someone who doesn't drive me as bat shit crazy as he does, and his life would be a lot more difficult without me reminding him to be his best self.

Maid of Honor's Wedding, 2010