So how did you meet your wife/husband/what not?

[bigolddave]

In 1959, I was bagging groceries at the Jewel Tea (remember those) when the stuck up girl who was checking started to laugh at something I said to a customer. We started talking, and she asked me if I was going to the Youth for Christ rally the next evening. I said yes, what time should I pick you up? She was taken aback, but agreed to go with me. We dated off and on while in college, got married in 1964.

I don't know how she puts up with me.

 

[feralmerril]

2004 I was 63, theresa was 46. I have a old cheapskate friend. He called me up to come over as he had a couple chicks at his house. Oh, by the way, kin you stop to the liquer store and pick up some tequilla and mix? I really think he called me to supply the booze. I knew one was his new girl friend but wasnt sure which one--for awhile.
Turned out theresa used to date him a long time back. She was recuperateing from a back injury and on a walker or crutchs. I was going through tough times as I was nurseing another woman friend that was dieing, (a long unbeliveable story), plus my dad was on his death bed in wisconsin and I was flying back and forth from california trying to take care of business. From normal peoples view, my situation probley was strange but explainable.
The friend that was dieing encouraged me to go meet her. I really wasnt going to.
The other girl was at a bad time of her life when I had met her and I had moved her in to hopefully nurse my dad who had alzhimers. That hadnt worked out, and in the meantime she had got cancer with no insurance etc, and I had picked up the tab as my ethics wouldnt let me just shove her out.
Actualy theresa helped me out with cindy. She died about a week before we got married. (Her daughters came from canada and got her about a month before she died. The daughters were poor and I literaly paid their way down and gave them a vehicle to drive her back).
Anyway Theresa is my best friend and we are never apart. She takes good care of me and I really dont have to lift a finger. We will see how this goes. It hasnt dawned on her yet that today is my brithday!

 

[Iggy]

feralmerril,

From the sound of things, you may just have a keeper on your hands too.

Now about this birthday thing. Happy Birthday. You might just be able to "twist" this to your advantage if you work it right.

Keep your eyes open for the right moment!!

On the other hand, you may be under estimatin' that gal and she'll wind up blindsidin' you.

Have fun either way!!

 

[rburg]

Wow, Feral's 69 today? Happy Birthday

And I like the land far, far away.

In 1964 I was 16. I wanted a drivers license in the worst way, but I had mean parents. They insisted I take Drivers Ed. OK, besides summer school wouldn't be bad since the football coach was teaching it. He was a good guy, if strict. You just learned to play by his rules, always, and without question. Once he had you under his thumb, life became good for you.

We had all kinds of students wanting to take the class, including some from other schools. We had a few weeks of class, then we moved to the driving portion for about a month. The class part was easy, you sat bolt upright in your seat, paid attention to everything the coach said. You didn't snicker doze off, chew gum, anything that could remotely be considered disrespectful. The kids from the other schools didn't know the rules. But some of them were so scared of the coach they caught on quick. We kind of liked the girls, but of course had no use for the guys.

Then we got to the driving portion. We had to drive a certain number of hours. The coach allowed his favorites to pick, then filled in the openings with the others. 4 students and the coach, 3 students to the back seat and the student driver up front. We'd switch off a few times per session. One day we had to pick up a girl from the next town over.

I'd seen her in class, but didn't realize who she was. I recognized her brothers car out front (I didn't like him.) But we drove together a few times so I just knew her name.

Then in 1968 one of my best friends was getting married. She was the maid of honor, I was one of the ushers. At the reception we sat together. Then we went out the next night, and about everynight thereafter. Turned out OK. We got married in 1970 (the couple who's wedding we were in stopped speaking to us after we started going out, still don't know why.) Its OK, in about a month it'll be 40 years. The other couple only made it a couple of years. They reportedly predicted we'd be divorced in a year. I never heard it directly, and I don't care at this late date.

 

[DCWilson]

My wife and liked to say that we found each other in the bottom of a trench in Greece. We were both grad students in classical languages at different schools and got accepted to the same dig. Then at the excavation site we got paired off as trenchmasters on the perimeter of an old Byzantine fortification. The walls had been built from the available materials at a site where a thousand years of earlier construction had left a rich supply of precut limestone and marble building pieces. We weren't going to find anything intact in an environment like that, but at the bottom we could find old foundation blocks and footing trenches that could be interpreted to determine what was there before. That was crucial, because the chronology of the site was disputed. About 200-300 years were poorly understood.

That was 1969. We married in 1974. She was leaving a bad marriage with a couple of kids, and I got an instant family of almost teenage daughters. She has Alzheimer's Disease now, and is probably in her last 500 days based on what we saw happen to her mother. The first four decades were so enjoyable and rewarding that they make the present situation a little easier to handle.

 

[feralmerril]

Thanks guys. I just went in, scalded and scrapped. Put on a new shirt. She came in and wondered how she should dress. I said dress like we are going to mesquite. (A casino at state line.) She asked me if this was the 28th or 29th? Our daughters brithday is the 28th. Then of course it dawned on her. She asked can we afford mesquite? I said no. Thats why you got to win! She hates gambling. I used to be a VERY heavy gambler but gave it 95% up for her and because we are now retired. Soooo, when she gets ready, we are off to mesquite!

 

[Wayne02]

I put an add in the local little nickel paper (this was before Gore invented the internet).

I received 25 letters back, most with pictures as requested. Ended up with one of them and we have been married 20 something years now.

I was very honest and out front with my interests, beliefs etc, and she was the same. I suspect that is why we have been mostly compatible all these years.

 

[venomballistics]

My wife and I were moderators in a forum of religious nature.
Each year we'd all get together someplace and gather round ye olde campfire to put some faces to the names.
Being a mustang driver ... just give me an excuse for a road trip
well call it dumb luck or divine intervention ... the scenario was a perfect setup for getting to know each other at every turn ...
Two years of mutual travel between Nebraska and Wisconsin followed. then the chapel bells finally rang on 10/11/2008

 

[deduke1907]

1961 was dateing a girl who wanted to g out one night and i said that i had told my buddy tom i would go shoot pool with him. she said that she would get a girl for tom and that we could all do some thing together. well did she make a mistake in getting a girl for tom as that girl has now been my wife for 47 years

 

[nicky4968]

I truly get to use Jack Benny's line.
"I met my wife at the May Company. You know the May Company; once you take something out of the store, you can't bring it back!"

 

[ditrina]

She was 10.. I was 11............
I moved in next door.......
YES I married the girl next door.............
41 years this year....
We know each other 50 years..
She started out as my best freind.. and still is....

 

[11B Lifer]

How I Met My Wife

Shooting competition in college. She was on a competing team and later I coached her. For her birthday the kids and I pooled our money and bought a bull barrel flat top receiver for her AR15-she cried. After 34 years of shooting and hunting with me she has cancer-so we're in a different match now.

 

[Rule 303]

In the college libary after I ETSed from the Army.
We have been married 39 years.

Rule 303

 

[Jst1mr]

Halloween party at a dorm on the U of MN campus. She was Pipi Longstocking or some such and I was Father Time or a wizard of some sort....made an odd-looking couple that night, and some may say we still do, but we're celebrating 30 years this fall.

 

[NCTexan]

I was in high school and delivered a Chicken Delight Dinner to her house. There was instant chemistry!

I loved the way she looked (beautiful) and she evidently liked the way I smelled (like fried chicken).

That eventually lead to three years of dating and 42 years of marriage... two children and three grandchildren.

She's stuck with me through the Corps, eight company moves across and out of the country... and is the best wife ever as well as my best friend.

 

[Hofstet]

33 years ago on a United flight from NY to CLE. She was the flight attendant in first class (back when it was affordable).

 

[truckemup97]

We met the first time when she came to our church with a friend. That was about sixth grade. Then in ninth grade, us country kids had to come into town to school, so we went to school together until we graduated. Our second date was the Senior Prom. We dated through college, even though the colleges were 100 miles apart. We got married in December of our senior year, almost 20 years ago. I have no idea why she's kept me around that long. It sure wasn't for my money.

 

[enfield]

At a carnival -- she was 11, I was 14.

Prettiest girl I've ever seen. We have some gorgeous daughters, too.

 

[2000Z-71]

Well my wife was a bridesmaid the first time I got married.

Actually it's not as scandalous as it sounds. My wife and I had known each other all through college. We were good friends and never dated, we were always dating other people. When I started dating my first wife, those two became friends and my first wife invited her to be part of the bridal party.

Well after that my wife to be married the wrong guy. I got divorced 3 years later. She got divorced about a year after me. We started talking long distance with her in Albany, New York and me in Denver, Colorado. Two friends of mine were getting married in Orange County, NY. I flew into Albany, she met at there, we drove down to Orange County and stayed at the bed and breakfast that hosted the wedding reception. She flew out to Colorado a couple of times, I flew back for a memorable 4th of July blue crab steam at her uncle's in Virginia. The joke of the trip was, fly back east, see the girlfriend, get crabs.

She managed to get a job with AT&T and moved in with me in Denver. We got married about a year later in Hawaii. It will be 10 years in September and we've got a 5 year old daughter that's become the center of our lives.

She shouldered a heavy load when she first moved out to Denver. My dad was entering hospice care suffering rejection from an earlier heart transplant. Not only was she there for me, but she was there for my dad having conversations with him that neither me nor my mother could. One of the things my dad told her was, "I knew that you were the right girl for my son the first time I met you." She was flattered and started to thank him, made a realization and stopped in mid-senence to say, "The first time you met me was at your son's wedding rehearsal dinner." He replied that he knew, he just couldn't say anything at the time. My mom has since verified that, I guess he had a very serious conversation with her if he should say anything to me before I got married the first time.

We've asked each other if we regretted no figuring it out sooner. We both say no as it makes us appreciate what we have much more having to take difficult paths to get to it.

 

[sureshotbob]

She was working part time at night at my buddy's resturant waitressing. But the funny thing is I don't remember her before a friday night that I stopped in for dinner before I went out for the night. My friend and some of the other girl's called me several time's but I was not home. At about 10:00 pm she tried thinking I'd still be out but I picked up and we ended up going out for coffee. We dated about 4 month's then I had her and her 15 and 12 year old son's move in with me a year later we got married . We've been married sense July 5th 1992.If I'd have known what the boy's would have put me through I'd probaly have run but after all I think she was worth it. As my Italian buddies would say she is a GOOD WOMAN!!!!