Where was your first time?

Sometimes, you need a good misleading title.

No. I’m not talking about that. Not only is that private, my husband would kill me. We’re both a little old school in that department.

So what first time am I talking about?

Where was the first time you met your husband/wife/significant other?

I have always been interested in relationship stories. I love the first meetings, especially when one wasn’t interested in another. Or they met at a random place. Even the meetings while dating someone else. I don’t condone cheating in any way, but sometimes, you realize you’re with the wrong person when you find the right one.

Also, I would love to know how meeting someone in a bar happens. Mr. A and I met before we were legal in bars, and in our dry county where we went to college, not many bars anyways.

While I’ve told the story of how the husband and I met at the gym through his fraternity brothers, there’s more to it.

We went to dinner the next night, and yes, we have been together ever since. But we weren’t instantly boyfriend and girlfriend. We hung out in the library together, working on homework, more like I was in awe that this super cute boy wanted to hang out with me.

I have later found out, that the first time he took me home to meet his mom, step-dad, and brother, his mom had threatened the other two to behave and not screw it up. I told you how awesome my MIL is, right?

There was the fraternity St. Patty’s day party. The first real fraternity event that we attended together. Yes, I already knew every guy, but it was a little different to be there with a date. I’d walk off to talk to someone and no more than 10 minutes later, he was right next to me again. He wasn’t following in a clingy way, just checking on me and such. It was adorable.

Man, we are young. So glad his hair doesn't look like that, and no clue why his collar is popped. We were young...

(He would die if he saw this. But wow, we were young…This was at that St. Patty’s Day party.)

This was the Thursday before Spring break started.

He came up to, what I thought, visit his big brother in the fraternity, who happened to live in the same city as I do. I was working, but we hung out when I would get off or on my days off. I was clueless that he only came to hang out with me. It snowed on this spring break, and the poor thing only had short sleeve polos, so we had to go and buy him a jacket.

When I returned to school that Sunday, which was the day before my 19th birthday, he and I were talking about us. I told him that my friends were asking about us and what we were. He wanted to know what I was telling them. I said that it seemed like we were together, but maybe not official. I asked what he was telling his friends and he said that he would be telling them I was his girlfriend. This was his sly little way of saying we were “official”.

(I’m about to reveal how young we are. Oh, well.)

I then went to the restroom, and when I came back, he was on the computer. I asked if I could check my e-mail, and when I did, I had a Facebook notification. My class was the first class to have Facebook from the start in college. You know, the days when only college students could get it?? The cute, shy, adorable boy had requested to be my boyfriend on Facebook, to make it really official. (How did people know if others were really dating before this invention? So weird. And yes, I’m showing how young I am. Get it.)

We may have first met in a gym, but there were lots of other “firsts” and hang outs before we became what blossomed into us today.  First time he held my hand started with us interlocking pinkies while watching a movie. He tells me he was so nervous. First kiss in his dorm room, and he was shaking like a leaf.

He is still that sweet and shy 19 year old college freshman who gets nervous when something new comes up. He shook at our wedding just like he did when he first kissed me and told me he loved me. He’s my best friend.

Enough about my mushy relationship. How did you two meet? Was it funny? Was it love at first sight, or did you have to learn to like each other? Who chased who?

These are my favorite stories.

Girlfriends

I’ve always been one to hang out with the boys. I’m not sporty or a tom boy, but I have always connected more with guys and been able to form much closer friendships with them.

My best friend in kindergarten was a boy. I was the only girl at his birthday parties for three years. Then he moved. It was heartbreaking. Oh 6-year-old romance….

But that trend has followed me until this very day. I mean, I couldn’t come up with bridesmaids, but other than my brother, my other “bride’s man” is my best friend since 4th grade. We didn’t go to college in the same city ( or even state), and he now lives even farther away for grad school, but when we talk, it’s like nothing has ever changed. We may not talk all the time, but if there is every anything going on, we can pick up the phone and call.

Aren’t I supposed to have that kind of relationship with a girl? Aren’t I supposed to be with my maid of honor constantly by this time and be talking with her about wedding plans and babies?

I mean, I have girl friends. I have a group of four who have taken over my bachelorette party and planned some surprise night, which I am so appreciative of, especially since they aren’t in the wedding. But….

I don’t feel I can call and just chat or talk about problems. I mean, the fiance and I are great, but sometimes he annoys me and I just need to vent.

And now, the problem is about to get even trickier. All the guys that I’m friends with are even in fiance’s fraternity, so there is a level of understanding that I’m taken and he knows it’s not a problem. I probably can get away with being a little flirty because so many of them have taken roles of big brothers, so there isn’t any awkwardness of “does he like me?”  “does she like me?”

But here we are. About 4 months from moving to a new place, where neither of us knows anyone and we both are going to have to make some new friends. Easy for him. Lots of guys in law school. I’m sure he’ll find plenty that he connects with and want to hang out with. Me? Well….not going to be as easy.

I mean, how comfortable would your significant other be if you were out hanging out with guys he didn’t know, without him?? My point exactly.

So, what do I do? I’m sure I will find some girls that I connect to, but in my 23 years on this earth, I have yet to find a true female friend. In high school, I may not have chosen the best groups, but even they had close friends. I just wasn’t one of them. I always seemed to get walked on and used as a source of jokes. I had a “best friend” crush an entire box of exlax into a soda while at a party and sent me to the hospital. Aren’t teenagers sweet??

So, I turn to you. What do I do? Do I forge friendships that I’m not going to be comfortable with, or do I do what comes naturally and face, possibly, problems in my new, and already challenged marriage due to law school? I do not do well when I don’t have friends or people to turn to and I’m not going to be able to turn to the fiance as much because he will be under his own stress and pressures and won’t be able to deal with me and my girly whining.

I feel like that’s what I’m doing now, but I’m terrified. I’m terrified of being lonely the rest of my life. I know I will have my husband, but I need more than that. He has his friends and his own things going on. I need mine. I’m just not sure what to do.

So, I put it you to see if you have any advice. Maybe someone out there has been through the same thing.Maybe.

I’m a Liar

Yep. I lied.

I don’t like doing it, but I felt I had to.

I tend to lie to make others happy. I feel this is a double edged sword at times. I want them to be happy, but they would be upset if they found out the truth. Grr.

Tonight was date night. Not a planned date night, but we decided to go out for a nice dinner, get some ice cream, and walk around by the river downtown. We try to make sure to do little romantic nights every once in a while, and we had a little extra cash, so that’s what we decided to do.

We came home and curled up to some Netflix and settled in for the night.

Until his phone started vibrating. One of his groomsmen sent a text telling fiance that he and some of the other fraternity guys were at the bar and wanted him to come up. He didn’t send anything back, but told me he was just going to stay in since it was already a little late. (Bars here close at 12pm SHARP. Moist counties are dumb….)

Well, fiance is not the stereotypical fraternity guy. He likes his brothers, but he’s not a huge party-er and doesn’t like to get drunk. Drink, yes. Drunk- not so much.

While I REALLY wanted him to stay home with me and watch movies and go to bed, we will be moving in 4 months. Fiance has grown up in the same town we go to school in, as many of his best friends. In 4 months, it will be the first time he has lived in a new place, so I knew it was a big deal for him to go tonight.

So, I lied.

I told him, “Go out. You don’t have a choice. I feel like going to bed, so just go out and see the guys since you won’t be able to call them at any minute once we move.”

He did the typical, “Are you sure?” and then sent a message back that he would be there in a few minutes. I knew he wanted to go, but he didn’t want to upset me.

To make it one better, I even drove him to the bar so he wouldn’t have to worry too much about how much he had and then driving back. I’ll be picking him up in about 1.5 hours.

So here I sit. Watching The Ugly Truth, eating ice cream and writing my blog.

Was this bad, or was it just something I needed to do?

i DO want him to have fun and get as much time with his friends as possible,but…I kind of wanted him to be here with me tonight.

And, weird as it sounds, I was friends with all the fraternity guys before we started dating. I have ALWAYS been friends with guys. I am NOT the sorority type at all. I think guys are fun and it’s easy for me to relax and be myself with guys, especially guys that are in fiance’s fraternity since they all know I’m taken. It’s great.

Also, I’ve had several really awful girl friends who have done some pretty awful things, so I’m a little cautious with girls.

But it’s also hard when they have “guys night” because that means I can’t go and I refuse to be like the other girlfriends that insist in tagging along, even when the guys don’t want them to, and then the guys complain about them later.

I’m whining. I know. I’m sorry.

I think I’m just stressed and a little lonely. I think I need a girls night. My bachelorette party is too far away…

Do you do the same for your husbands or boyfriends? Do you put aside your feelings for them to do something they want?

Goodnight. Gerard Butler is calling my name…

New Teacher. New Wife.