Ellie & Elizabeth

I know a few people that don't like their husbands. (I mean, I am a divorce mediator...). I don't know why this is or what to do about it, but I get a little teasing because not only do I love my husband, I really like that guy. I gush about him even. When I tell you our story, if you're rooting for me, you'll be a little on the fence about him but hold on until the end, it gets better.

And by the way, the pics in the story are of my back porch, where Hubby strung lights as a surprise for me a couple of weeks ago, after we saw them at a resort and I casually mentioned that would look pretty on our porch.

Who does that? Isn't he dreamy? I'm still waiting on his permission to post his picture. He's cute stuff.

WHERE IT ALL BEGAN...

There he was, in his green and yellow tank top, white Puma tennis shoes and his brown, curly hair cut as close to a mullet as curly hair could get. I saw him across the crowded pizza place/arcade. It was the 80s and hair was a BIG thing. I'm not sure how he missed me with my huge Aquanet helmet of hair, I could've knocked someone out with my 'wings' but he didn't notice me at first. Oh yeah, it could have been because he was on a date with someone else.

Not cool.

We had mutual friends and did finally get introduced. I was a little taken with him at the ripe old age of 14 and have never forgotten the day we met 31 years ago. He doesn't remember the day we met at Pepperoni's Playhouse. Not even a little bit.

Totally not cool, Mr. Right.

Apparently, my braces and huge bangs did not get his attention later either. I threw a going away party for my friend who was moving and invited him. Turns out my friend's older sister, ahem, age 17, also liked him, was it the curly mullet??, so we decided to let him pick whomever he liked better, if either of us, and we'd be fine with whatever happened. At the party, we sat on either side of him, and I'm sure he felt like man of the hour. In reality, he was a quiet, humble guy who probably felt a little uncomfortable with all this attention. But then...

That dude picked her. Even kissed her on my front porch!!

I know!!!

How was I going to eventually marry this guy if he keeps forgetting me and kissing other people on my porch??

So I admitted defeat and a few months went by. We became good friends and he'd tell me his girlfriend woes over school lunch. I didn't have any dating troubles at fourteen, so I was pretty interested in hearing about his.

Finally, the day came when he realized the girl of his dreams was sitting right in front of him, in some cute, black stirrup pants. We'd laughed and shared enough lunches to become the best of friends. He needed a date to a Halloween party, and finally, it was me. On our first date, he picked me up in a ratty gray Blazer, so rusty that you could see straight through to the ground in some spots of the floorboard. He drove a few minutes, then promptly ran out of gas, LOL., thankfully beside a gas station. On our next date, again a Halloween theme, we went to a haunted house where his little brother got hit in the eye with a rubber snake, so the date ended abruptly to take his brother to the hospital.

It was a date with his little brother?? Yes, yes, it was, I took what I could get.

Thankfully, he didn't view me as a curse, because really, we were pretty nervous about what could happen on date #3, but eventually, we made it to our third, uneventful, romantic date.

The back porch, the night of the surprise...before the fall flowers were added. Bear popped in the pic, reminding me that he also helped with the secret light surprise. He still reminds me every other day. — The back porch, the night of the surprise...before the fall flowers were added. Bear popped in the pic, reminding me that he also helped with the secret light surprise. He still reminds me every other day.

Eight years later (come on, folks, I was only 14 when this story started)...I walked down the aisle to the man who would become my husband, the father of my children and my everything. I knew many years before what it took him eight years to realize. I should've put on those stirrup pants a long time ago.

Very cool.

Don't give up on your dreams, sometimes they are right in front of you.

And always wear cute pants.

Love,

Elizabeth