Marriage Words

The summer after my Junior year in college, I decided to move to Tulsa. I had no plans, I just didn't want to be in Little Rock over the summer again. I moved to Tulsa with a friend from college, and we rented a 2 bedroom apartment. I applied at a number of places, and I was offered one job, but I didn't take it for some reason that I can't recall. Then, bills started to come in, and I had no income to pay them. So, I went across the street to a T.G.I. Fridays and applied. It just so happened that the manager that was working that day grew up in Sherwood, Arkansas on Geronimo Drive, which was 2 streets over from where I grew up on Custer Place. She interviewed me, had me take some personality test which I got a 100,000,000,000% on, and then she hired me to be a food runner for the summer.

It was probably just about ten years ago to the day that I walked into the T.G.I. Fridays for my first day of work. I arrived early to make a good impression on the food industry. I was waiting at a table for the morning meeting, it started, and I was introduced to everyone... no one seemed to care. A few people, men and women, looked at me with the "fresh meat" look in their eyes. A few minutes into the meeting, this beautiful blonde goddess walked in with this disgusted and irritated look on her face. She sat down, and a few minutes later, her boyfriend who she rode to work with came in and sat down. After the meeting, she looked at me with the same disgusted look on her face, and asked, "Who are you?!" To which I cheerfully replied, "I'm Dustin!" She rolled her eyes and walked past me. (I only just now found out that I had been sitting in her regular chair.)

The disgusted blonde and I started dating later that summer. We got engaged in March 2003, and we got married October 11, 2003. We are pretty awesome together, if I can say that about us. If one of us were to die early, we joke that we could never date again because we are too flatulantly comfortable together.

We have served in the Peace Corps together in Armenia, we have been to 16 countries together, we have raised two wonderful dogs together, we have moved 12 times together, we have had horrible stomach ailments together, we have gotten lost in Queens in the middle of the night together, we have gone horseback riding through Tuscany together, we have gone para-sailing, camping, and hiking together, we have sat and stared at wonderful pieces of art together, we have read books together.

Of course, we have our problems too. We fight. Lindee punches. I yell. We disagree. I'm right. Lindee corrects me. We realize how silly we would look if people watched us when we argue with each other.

There is not another woman I could imagine spending my life with. I pray daily to be a better husband, and a better man for her. Lindee... don't die on me... because I can't imagine learning to fart in front of another woman.