I had originally intended to write a post detailing my funniest experiences during my 7 years in staffing in honor of getting a new job, but humor will have to wait. Instead, I decided to blog about my sappy how-I-met-my-husband story because today marks 3 years love, bickering, and laughter with Mr. Cooper!
Where do I begin? You should probably get the back story leading up to the night we met just to get the full picture, so bear with me. For 4 years, I was in a relationship with a controlling, jealous, jerk who liked to grab my wrists when we argued. By no means was I the perfect girlfriend, I was 16, hormonal, and crazy to be completely honest, but I grew out of it… he didn’t. Anyway, I had put together this plan that I was either going to take a year off from school, become a flight attendant and travel, or I was going to end up going insane staying with my bad-for-me boyfriend in the middle of nowhere. I had also made my best efforts to get myself in order for a transfer to the university my closest friends attended. I knew exactly what I was doing, where I was going, and I was 100% set on being single for a very long time. Because of my parents’ messy divorce and the traumatic experience of dating him, I didn’t even think I wanted to get married EVER at that point, and I certainly didn’t want to marry him. So I broke it off and I was spending a lot more time with my best friend since 1996, Tank (I call her this because autocorrect changes Tabi to Tank every chance it gets).
In honor of Tank’s birthday (which was yesterday), we had planned on grilling out and going to the movies for a girl’s night. At the very last minute, Tank decided that she’d rather go listen to her fiance play music in a local bar despite neither of us being old enough to get into the place without accompanying the band. Her fiance and I chit-chatted while she was getting ready, during which time he scrolled through his Facebook friend’s list and pointed out all of his single friends before trying to sell them to me like a used car. “Austin, I don’t want or need a boyfriend. I don’t do casual dating, and there’s no point in trying to find someone new when I’m not even going to be on this side of the state this time next year,” I explained to him.
We arrived to the bar shortly after his unsuccessful attempts to pawn me off on his buddies and we were easily the youngest people in the place. This is the kind of joint that mostly attract middle aged men and senior citizens who were in search of cheap beer and a decent cover band. They were all old enough to be my parents (including a lady with too much mousse in her hair which nearly caught on fire when someone waved a Marlboro too close to her noggin… but that’s a story for another day) and if not for the company of my dearest Tank, I would’ve been miserable. And then I noticed a familiar silhouette in the doorway.
Here’s the irony in all of this, folks. Mr. Cooper and I had attended high school together. I only knew of him from those years because he dated a girl in most of my classes, and they argued by the girls bathroom every morning. He had also worked for the staffing agency where I worked in the office the year before. I could not remember his name to save my soul, however, and proceeded to gawk at him the rest of the night until he FINALLY asked me to dance on the very last song.
Keep in mind, neither of us are dancers. I stepped on his feet, he stepped on mine and tried to convince me it was because he was drunk… even though he’d only had one beer the entire night. At the end of it all, he asked for my phone number, text me the next day, and the rest is history.
If you know me at all, you know how much of a control freak I am. My plans were ruined because I was immediately smitten. I am not a flight attendant, nor did I transfer across the state. I didn’t take a year off, I graduated on time, and I’m married! He ruined my life in the best way. As a matter of fact, Mr. Cooper pretended to fling a bug on me while I tried to type this thing, laughing all the while at the sheer terror on my face. Here’s to 50+ more years!
Married with Furchildren 