How it all began...

In honor of the six-years-one-day anniversary of our first date, I give you The Story. We had been friends for about a year when the date happened. I wasn’t sure it was actually a date until it was over; Aaron swears he made it clear to me from the beginning. Either way, he invited me to see Fantasia 2000 at the IMAX with his friends Paul and Abby. We met them at the theater for the 8:00 showing, but it was sold out. The next show was at 11. Paul and Abby bailed, leaving Aaron and I with three hours to kill. We had dinner (El Fenix?), drove around Dallas for a while, listened to some Milli Vanilli and basically just hung out together until it was time to head back to the theater. Let me pause the story here and make it clear that I had a BIG FAT crush on him at this point. We’d been friends for a while, mostly over email and IM, but during the weeks preceding this evening we’d spent more and more time together in person, and I had it bad. So we get back to the theater and find seats. Aaron is on my right. The movie is fun, but I’m not really paying attention. My focus is completely on Aaron and what he’s doing, how he’s sitting, is he trying to get closer to me???? My thoughts are racing, but I’ve convinced myself he’s not interested. But, just in case, I leave my right hand on the armrest. Just in case. Before I know it, he’s holding my hand. HOLDING MY HAND. He likes me. I am dying. He continues to hold my hand through the end of the movie and the entire drive home. We choose not to discuss said handholding, focusing instead on the fact that we were both on yearbook staff in high school and how fun that was. Fascinating. He takes me home and walks me to the door. The handholding has yet to be mentioned. He gives me a hug and leans in for a kiss. I don’t know where my brain was, but it took me a second to figure out what he was doing, and when I realized it, I smiled. And that kiss landed right on my teeth. Yeah baby. We laugh, and he says goodnight. That was a Sunday night, and Aaron moved to Nashville the following Thursday. We spent every night that week together. When he left, we decided to just stay in touch and see how things went. Nothing exclusive… that didn’t last long. It was official by February. Two and a half years of long-distance dating later, we were married and I joined him in Nashville.