I have a little story for you all. Because I was never actually engaged, not too many were able to ask or hear much about Martin and I, and how we came to be. I don't keep a journal, I know I should, and so, I thought I would write it all out and share. Life is great, this last year has been more than amazing, and the best year of my life, and all thanks to the man of my dreams.
Although Martin and I have known each other for about 4 years, our romantic relationship only trails back to around April of 2008. We met while working at Outback Steakhouse in Fremont, where I stayed for only about a year, although he was there about 5 (wow). During the year I worked there he had started a new relationship and was off and on in an old one, so dating wasn’t something on my mind. I found a great group of friends while working there who all thought highly of Martin, but didn’t necessarily spend a lot of time with him or his group of friends. He was one of the few that I tried to make conversation with regularly; if ever we were closing or opening together, so when there was downtime.
Just over a year after starting, because of many outside sources, I decided it was time to make a major change in my life, so.. I moved to Utah! My sister and favorite cousin were in the midst of moving themselves, and I thought, why not?
I kept in touch with a few people from work after I moved away, thank goodness for social networks like myspace and facebook. And for whatever reason, I would check every now and again to see how Martin was doing. Although I knew his brother better (he also worked at Outback with me, and actually trained me, and was my age) I had always felt a slight connection to Martin. Every time I was back in town I would try to visit Outback and have dinner with a few of my friends, or at least visit those working, and would love any opportunity to talk to him, just as friends, never with anything else in mind though.
After living in Utah about a year and a half and having so many problems with school, work, my health, living situation, and my financial situation, I decided that I wasn’t supposed to be there anymore. I moved back to Fremont and knew that I would find more what I was looking for in life there. On top of that, school would be cheaper, living would be cheaper, jobs pay more, etc. etc.
When I finally moved back and had let everything soak in after a few months, I met up with some friends at Outback just like old times. They were discussing some plans for the weekend and Martin’s show came up. I knew he had written some songs and played the guitar, but I had no idea he was pursuing a career in music. With a few friends I went to his show that weekend. Just happy to have gotten out of the house and been around some new people, it was enjoyable. On my way out, I said great show and goodbye and he said, let’s get some coffee later in the week, and I said sure. And that’s really where it started. After work one night we met up and went to bay street coffee, where we both found out neither of us drank coffee and we got hot chocolate. Talked for a few hours and I guess I kind of knew he was the one. In a nut shell at least. (Within the next week or so, I told my mom we were soul mates, but we weren’t going to date, we were just too different).
At the time we had very different lives; I had just met someone I thought I could date, and he did not want to date anyone, but we clicked. The following week I went out to dinner with him a few times, had a few more long conversations and then I spent a week away, visiting the one I thought I could date, and it turned out I was very wrong. It took that trip for me to realize a guy like Martin was what I really wanted, whether or not he was the one, wasn’t as important at the time. Long story short, it turned out we loved being around each other. We could see each other almost all day every day and not get sick of each other and from there it all happened so fast. He left for a cross country tour/vacation with his brother. After a month of being a way, a group of my friends went out to New York to surprise them, where I didn’t know what would happen, at that point we were friends, and that was it. He told me he loved me as we watched the sun rise in central park the first morning I was there, and we’ve been inseparable ever since.
After about a year of dating I knew I would never find anyone as amazing or someone even with the deep down ability to love me as much as he did, and so I knew, that was it. I think it was probably around the same time for him as well.
Never once had I been the one to initiate marriage conversation, yet it was brought up often. Whether to me, or my sister, he found a way to bring up “future wife” comments or “future brother-in-law” comments. Finally I asked, when’s this going to happen, since you seem so sure of it. And Martin replied with a “you’ll see.” At this point I think I just melted inside and was just hopelessly in love. We found ourselves happier than we had ever been and more in love than we ever expected. Random days would be thrown out (by Martin) of when we would get married and I just went with it. I had no idea the seriousness or how soon it was going to happen, and I was just overjoyed that I didn’t have to worry about it. I knew I would never find myself in a 6 year + relationship wondering, what am I doing, or what does he want to do. (Which was a fear of mine in the beginning).
One day it came up again, let’s get married, says Martin. And I said ok. How soon? He says, I like 2010, it’s a cool year, and easy to remember the anniversary. I say, how about January 2nd. He says, perfect :) and that was it. That afternoon, we realized that January 2nd is a palindrome (01/02/2010) and a Saturday, and we were so excited. We looked up court information for Santa Cruz, because we knew we had wanted to elope in Santa Cruz and from there we quickly planned the whole thing. It was a weekend so we couldn’t do it in a court, and we decided we wanted our families there. We had a picture perfect setting for the wedding festivities, Shadowbrook, one of our first dates, and for the next month or so we kept it all a secret. Christmas morning we announced to our families that we were getting married the following week, although some knew (for planning’s sake) and others had a hunch, because we had asked everyone to keep that date open for a very important dinner they were invited to. It was perfect, the weather, the ceremony, our families, and of course, us. That last month actually felt like it was forever until we were getting married. And when the day came it was an amazing joy and a sigh of relief. We did it. We got married and we are just overwhelmed sometimes with the love we have for each other.
