About US Part 2

Since my wife has finished writing the first post telling the story of how our relationship began, I will begin telling the story about what happened at that point and afterwards from my perspective.

When she told me about her background, I, due to my rather tolerant and loving nature, accepted it and did not let it bother me as it might have bothered ordinary people. My parents did teach me like Veronica mentioned that it's not the past of the person that matters but what they are doing to change that matters.

Anyways, the courtship began online in earnest and we started having longer and longer conversations. I remember one of the most controversial conversations we had typically covered abortion and usually ended in a stalemate. My wife, to this day, thinks she's always right on this and every other issue (how do I deflate such ego when I love the woman!).

We often would talk a few hours a day and it was nearly routine for us to talk in the afternoons. Occasionally we would carry on discussions during her classes that had computers and she'd be trying so hard to keep things quiet and usually she did.

In about July, she had reached the point where she felt like she had to tell me how she felt about me and of course, I encouraged her honesty because I also felt the same way, not with the same intensity though. The intensity of my love for her really grew during the year we lived together prior to our marriage but for her, the intensity was greatest in the period preceding that. After she confessed her feelings for me, I was still waffling about whether or not to start calling myself in a relationship even though it was online.

In August, I talked with her about having a thing for one of my friends in Tucson and contemplated dating her. This set her off in a fury and so she fired off an email that basically said that I needed to make a choice at that moment whether to continue with our friendship/relationship or to pursue other women. My being interested in other women was essentially a slap in the face for her since she already told me how she felt. That night after she wrote the email, I went to work and the whole time at work, my mind was buzzing with thoughts about how to deal with this and eventually I came to the decision that I should commit to her because if I chose the other route, I would have risked losing much more than I could have potentially gained. Thank God for pragmatism because it usually put me in the right direction. After that night, I came home and told her that she was right and I decided that I was going to stick with her and visit her when the time came to see her and then decide whether to be totally committed from that point on for good when I meet her in person.


In September, I helped a friend of mine move from his old home to a new home in 24 hours which was absolutely crazy and stupid. However, in the effort to help him move, I pushed myself to the limits physically and also had to deal with conditions that were certainly unsanitary. For a few days afterwards, I had problems with diarrhea and this threw off my whole training for a huge cycling event called the Cochise County Cycling Classic. This event was a 252 mile ride within 24 hours and the length itself means if anyone completes it, they are certainly worthy of being called one of the toughest persons on earth. I could have still pulled it off but the problem is that my getting sick threw off my training so bad that I felt that there was no way that I could have finished it and in reasonable time that I decided, screw it, and gave that up. Instead I booked a Greyhound to Amarillo, TX to meet Veronica.

The bus ride was not bad, but unfortunately we left about two hours late and this meant missing my major connection and being late to Amarillo by about 12 hours. This left Veronica a nervous wreck since she didn't know whether I was gonna show or not since I was 12 hours late. She even called my mother to check and of course, my mother said, he'll be there, just don't worry about it. She was right, I wasn't going to waste a hundred or so dollars not going on a bus trip or any trip for that matter. Anyways, I showed up at her house and I was lying on the lawn playing with her dog when she showed up at 5 PM on a warm afternoon on October 12, 2007.

I will say that this point was the point where I feel that I made one of the best decisions I ever made in my life, period, because I gained a wonderful wife who I love dearly and lost very little in the process.