Redefining Happiness

I met Tyler when I was 15 years old.

It was the summer before my junior year and his senior year. We met through our mutual friend Michael, who at the time we called "Wookie" for reasons that I can't remember anymore. Tyler knew Wookie through boy scouts and I knew Wookie from computer programming class. Tyler and I had known each other as acquaintances from track & field, where we both ran hurdles, but we'd never said more than, "hey."

The day I really remember getting to know Tyler, we were zipping around our hometown in Wookie's bright blue Subaru. I was riding shotgun, and I kept peering into the backseat at the lanky boy who kept shyly smiling at me.

He gave me his number when we parted ways that evening. I must have given him mine, but I can't remember and neither can he.

We dated for a year and a half back then, and then he graduated high school and that chasm that opens between those who have left high school and those who were still there opened up and we broke up.

I cried for months it seemed like.

For a couple years, he attended the junior college in the same Central California town where I went to college, and we hung out, made mutual friends, and were tentative friends. He left that town and moved north to Mount Shasta.

Almost two years after that, I ran into one of our mutual friends, Phillippe, at Jamba Juice. Phillippe -- most likely for lack of anything better to say -- asked me, "hey, how's Tyler?" And I said, "you know, I haven't actually talked to him for a while, so I don't know!"

I called Tyler that evening to see how he was.

One thing led to another, and we decided to try the whole dating thing again. It was going to be tough, because it was going to be long distance for a while, but we both had loved each other once and seemed to still have those feelings floating around.

Yesterday, a little more than four years later, we're still together and Tyler managed to (almost) surprise me with something special.

He asked me to marry him! And I'm a tough girl to surprise.

I might have said yes.

Actually, I did.

It's because I really like him.

I can't believe it.

I'm gonna get married!

Excuse me while I go get girly and mushy. I deserve it.

Ciao,
kc