I discharged from the USAF November of ’03. Sometime in March or April my bestie asked me if I remembered Arnold that hung out with her husband Nat. I did. I had met him about ten years prior. He was married at the time and hanging out with Nat during Guard weekend on their off time at Nat’s house. I paid him no attention when I popped in to visit with the bestie. The bestie that she is, called Arnold. He had just came home from Iraq a month prior to my coming home from Germany. The next thing I knew, he was coming over to her house to meet me.

We started calling each other. Neither one of us getting much sleep. Which led to dating. I remember one date in particular. When he dropped me off, he walked me to the gate of my yard. I put my arms out. He turns around and walks towards his car leaving me hanging with no hug.

I remember being at Arnold’s brother Brad’s house with Arnold and his mom when Arnold’s mom said to me “I need to have a serious talk with you!” as she slapped the seat cushion and then continued on “About you and my son!” She did a long pause. “Thank you! Thank you for making my boy happy! It’s the happiest I’ve seen him in a very long time.” When she slapped the seat cushion I thought “Boy! I’m in for it now! Don’t know what I did, but here it comes!”

One weekend while dating, we went camping. We accidently left the loaf of bread out on the picnic table. We discovered that when we were awoken with ruckus from raccoons. Something we both laughed about and still do to this day.

I knew I couldn’t let him slip away. The eye candy that he is. I couldn’t see the rest of my life without him. I didn’t want to lose the love of my life. What was a girl to do? I proposed to him. Yes! You read that right. I proposed to him asking him to marry me. He said yes. When it came time to pick a date for the big day we both liked the idea of having a better memory for that day. We were married on 11 September ’04.