So, I want to give you a little mushy gushy background to the hubs and my story! Let’s be honest, whether you are with someone or not on Valentines, we all love a good romance story. Now, full disclosure, I don’t think our story is the next one to be played on the big screen. But I do think we have a few very unique and special twists to our story. There are things that, looking back, I am just in awe of how this all came to be! If you watch “Friends” at all…my hubby surely is my lobster! For better or worse ;).
So, in 2008 I graduated from this super tiny college in the middle of the cornfields of Indiana. My 2 older brothers had been there and as much as I tried to avoid following their footsteps, I did not pave my own way when it came to my higher education. I did however, choose my own major and did not follow them in that way.
Upon graduation I came home without a job or any real prospects. I was prepping for the my state’s Miss America prelim competition. I poured everything into that and left the job hunt for after I was home from that week. While prepping. I went on a blind date set up by my mom and her friend. The date was with my mom’s friend’s son, and I think we both knew that this wasn’t going to go anywhere fast. We hung out most of that summer, but there were quite a few things that I wasn’t going to go along with, and I think he thought I was too young (I was 3 years younger than he). We took this 1 week hiatus from ANY communication and when 1 week turned into 2, (I was waiting him out) he contacted me saying, “We should talk.” Before we took that “break” from whatever we had going on, I didn’t have a job yet and had my resume at about 10 different locations. After those 2 weeks I had 2 jobs I was juggling and trying to sort through. I didn’t really have much time, so I told him to meet me at the mall after work. I had begun working as a trainer at the Apple Store in our mall and had a 3 hour window before I had to be at my other job where I ran the teleprompter for our news station. I still remember sitting outside on a warm August afternoon chatting with this guy when my future husband walked out the door of the mall. He also happened to work at the Apple Store and was helping a customer bring their new goodies to their car (carrying a huge computer through the mall is no fun…so we did this often for customers). Anyway, I’m sitting there with this other guy talking my ear off about all the changes he thought he should make in his life, and then telling me all the excuses about why he wasn’t about to make those changes, when Drew walks on by with this elderly couple and a cart loaded down with their new iMac and printer. I didn’t even look at the other guy, but instead shouted, “Hi Drew!” And raised my hand for a quick wave in his direction. The feeling I had in the pit of my stomach when he turned around is something I will never forget. “Oh, hi Kelsey!” He said back. The rest is history…well, kinda…
Needless to say, the convo with the other guy ended pretty quickly and we haven’t really spoken since. Oh well. Meanwhile, Drew and I where plunked down in the same 36” of desk space in the back of the Apple Store where I had 3 months to FLY through 9 months worth of training and tests. He was the Business Liaison and I was a trainer who had never really done much on a Mac except make movies in college. He was patient as I sat through hours of training modules. He kept the back of the store quiet when I had to test to the next level and even defended me when I really couldn’t handle one more interruption. He was a solid co-worker and an even better friend. BUT he was also 8 years older than I was and admittedly I was SOOOO done with the dating GAME! Good thing was, so was he. So, after an extremely frustrating day at work, he called me up and asked if I would join him for appetizers and a chat “about work” you know. ?
I did join him for that chat. We spent 3 hours at Applebees talking about everything BUT work. He made conversation easy and laughter was constant. I felt valued and cherished and heard and cared about. I felt a lot of things brewing…I knew, deep down, this was the beginning of something awesome!
We spent the next year and a few months getting to know each other and just how wonderful this all could be. Drew had once told me that he had all together written off dating and marriage, and then I walked into the back room of Apple and something in him said, “Not so fast…maybe this could work.” We worked at Apple together for 3 years our relationship was known only by those close to us at the store, but it was so special. We had really big conversations before we started dating. Knowing that neither of us wanted this to be any sort of “game” we very quickly laid out all our cards and said, this is who I am, if you can’t work with this, then we probably shoulnd’t continue. For us, this was the BEST THING EVER. We still had lots to learn about each other, like how he can’t stand catchup and how the smell of mustard make me want to run into the other room (don’t worry, we can now eat hot dogs and burgers with each other). But we knew the big stuff. My pastor growing up always said to “Major on the Majors” and “Minor on the Minors”, so we took that to heart. Knowing our condiments preferences were minors meant that we could learn, grow, and develop on the majors. Nothing else needed to hold that much weight.
Now, I could go into a lot of stories about our dating – like how we spent a road trip with a shaking car and a piece of paper shoved in the window to keep it up since it broke 10 minutes into the trip. Or the time we named our future daughter (See that post here). I remember inviting friends over for a bonfire at my parents so they could meet Drew. My parents were out for the evening, but they said it was okay to invite a few friends over to burn the branches and things my dad had piled up. Well, one 30′ high and 20′ in diameter bonfire later…I was a WRECK! I was so nervous we were going to burn down the entire street, or worse, attract the fire/police station –I’m a rule follower to my CORE! I once told on myself in middle school for forging my dad’s signature…the guilt almost killed me!! Anyway, there are so many stories. I remember one common thread through all of them – with each adventure, good or bad, fun or scary, new or new to us, I NEVER wanted to do anything else if Drew wasn’t with me for it all.
So, after months of anticipation, on January 1, 2010 Drew asked me to be his wife. We were married 9 months later. He is my best YES. I still feel so blessed that I get to call myself this man’s wife. We have been together for almost 11 years, and I can honestly say that, though we have had quite the ride, I feel like our adventure has only just begun!
