Burger of the Month

This post is for Carrie in honor of Valentine's Day, we're sharing the stories of how we met our husbands, best friends, etc. Hop on over to her blog to see more awesome lurve stories.


My high school orientation day was August 26th, 1992. My friends and I agonized over what to wear, how to act, and most importantly, where to meet up at the end of the day. We were trying desperately to NOT look like the freshman that we were. My boyfriend at the time, who wasn’t smart enough to get into the college prep high school that my friends and I attended, was supposed to come and meet me at the end of the day. He didn’t, and that was the biggest mistake of his life. (As told by him, much later)
After our first day spent wandering like idiots, having prison looking ID pictures taken, and getting our class schedules, we headed outside to officially begin our high school adventure. We were gathered in front of McDonald’s, directly across from the school, when the most perfect male I had ever seen walked past us, smiled, and got pulled along by his friends across the street. Being only 14, I didn’t quite realize that wearing a low cut bodysuit (remember those?!) and low slung jeans would actually gain attention. So my group of friends watched that group of friends as they walked away. The perfect specimen broke off from his friends, and headed back toward us. Reluctantly, two friends followed. His decision to cross the street that day changed my whole life. No joke, no exaggeration.
He walked up to me, flanked by two friends, and they introduced themselves one by one. First, my eventual husband reached for my hand and said, “Hi, they call me Sucio.” (for my cauc friends, that means “dirty”) and my reply, “I bet they do!” His friends were Tony, “the mentor” and Flaco. To this day, I swear I never knew Flaco’s real name. Sucio asked me if I had a boyfriend, and I remember feeling so bold when I looked around and said, “Do you see one here? Then I must not have one.” I know, lame by adult standards, but it’s really witty when you’re a kid.
So we verbally sparred with the boys for a few minutes, then they went inside McDonald’s. A friend was pushing me to go in after them, but I was too nervous. She said, “Listen, you want the Burger of the Month. So let’s just go in,” In fact, I didn’t even like the Cheddar Melt, which, in case you didn’t know, was the Burger of the Month in August 1992. So, I followed “the guy in the green pants” which would be DH, into McDonald’s and piled into a booth near the door with my friends. We watched these guys for a few minutes, and were in awe by how grown up they seemed. The girls they were with seemed like full fledged adults to us, and we were sure that they were going to ignore the stupid freshmen that had come following them. But no, DH came on over to our table to talk to me, and before his friends finally pulled him outside again, he handed me a pen and stuck his hand out. Is this the universal gesture for “May I have your phone number?” ?? Again with my witty repartee, I asked what he wanted. He asked me to write “something” on his hand, so I wrote, “Hello.” He asked, more specifically, if I’d give him a phone number where he could possibly reach me. Not quite specific enough, since I didn’t give him MY phone number, but a friend’s. Hey, I didn’t know this guy from Adam and I wasn’t giving him my home number. Besides, that missing boyfriend had some serious jealousy/possessive problems. So he left, and after calling my friend three times looking for me, I finally let her give him my phone number.
I won’t say it went smoothly after that, but it went. We grew up, we made mistakes, we separated, we made up… because no matter what happened in our lives, we just didn’t want to be apart. We got married 6 years later. In April, we’ll celebrate our 10th wedding anniversary. I feel like we’re incredibly lucky to have found one another, because things like that just don’t happen every day. He’s been in my life longer than I lived before he came into it, and I can’t imagine me without him. It’s almost as if he was always there, and I’m never really sure if it’s me talking, or him, or who said what. Sometimes I think that line between us is blurred, but that’s okay. I wouldn’t have it any other way.
A long time ago, I heard a myth that humans had once had four limbs, two heads, and one heart. The two heads meant they kept one another company, but they shared one heart. Anyway, they angered the gods, and as a result, they were each split into two, forever missing their other half. So when you found your other half, you didn’t love them for who THEY were, rather, you recognized them as a vital part of yourself. I like that. It works for me.