Where do I start? I know that the beginning is usually a good place, but that also will depend on your definition of “beginning”, because there are so many “beginnings” between Roy and I with our various backgrounds that the “beginning” depends on what the issue is. I suppose, at least since this blog is about things that have happened to me, to Roy, to us, and to those around us that mean something to us, that we’ll start with our beginning and how we met (or at least an abridged version of it).
Both Roy and I were previously divorced – different reasons, different times – never a good thing – for us or for the individual that was involved with us in the past. It happens. I’d like to say it was completely the other person’s fault, but that’s never the case. It doesn’t truly matter. The fact that we were divorced previously is just a place to start.
I was married for 25 years previously. I was in the process of divorce right after my middle child died in 2001. My marriage had been crumbling before that, and that just put it over the edge. We are still friends and I still care but we were so diametrically different at that stage in life that it just ended. I swore I’d never get involved other than superficially again. Losing a child, a part of me, and then getting divorced just about destroyed me emotionally. I’m not proud of that, but it did. The point is, however, that I never wanted to expose myself emotionally to anyone again. The actual divorce was final in 2004, but it was in the midst of crumbling at that time. In the midst of this, I met a lot of friends online. I was part of a couple of medical support groups that catered to those that had issues like my son did before he died and that helped me cope. I talked to people and met them online that way and wasn’t afraid of any of that. I’d met a few of them face-to-face and realized that not all online people are gargoyles or con artists like so many thought in the early 2000s (and like so many still do, actually). I guess I figured out that while they are out there, they are also out there in real life or meeting them in a bar (very yucky place to meet) or wherever.
So where does all of this bring me? It brings me to the fact that Roy and I met online. Now the first thing most people think is that we met on a dating site or in a chat room. Nope. That’s not even close. We didn’t meet through anyone else we knew and it wasn’t through my support groups. We met in late 2002 through an accidental email.
What’s an accidental email, you may think? I’m so glad you asked (even if you didn’t, this is my blog so I can act like you did). An accidental email is like a wrong number. It was to someone that wasn’t intended but really was, since neither Roy nor I have ever believed in “coincidence”.
On November 23, 2002, I had gone to a business meeting in southern California (good ol’ LaLaLand, where I was born but where I never belonged). I was living in the San Francisco Bay Area and had for many years, raising my kids and working a part time home business. I had driven down by myself on Friday, November 22, 2002, and was driving back over-night to arrive home in the early morning of Saturday, November 23, 2002. Essentially, it was a quick back-and-forth trip. I arrived home very very early in the morning, but, due to the long drive, I couldn’t go straight to sleep so I decided to check email just to see if there was anything I needed to know or do. I didn’t expect much from a Friday night into a Saturday morning, but it gave me enough time to unwind and stop vibrating from the drive.
When I sat down, I found a variety of email: spam, business, personal, and random things. One random item caught my eye and I looked at it first, as it wasn’t from someone whose email address I recognized and it didn’t look like a spam address either. When I opened it, it was a series of jokes (dirty jokes, to be exact, but that’s another thing) that made me laugh (I have a warped sense of humor. What can I say?). It came from Roy and was addressed to “John” and said something along the lines of “these are for you” and “I’ll see you soon”. Ok, so I could tell something was being sent between friends and it wasn’t intended to be sent to me and that they were attempting anyway to set up time together.
“Ok, self,” I thought, “what would you want?” Well, I’m good at having discussions with myself so I answered quite quickly and thought that if it were *me*, I would want the person in question to tell me that I sent it to the wrong place.
So I just sent back a quick email saying “I’m sorry, you sent this to the wrong person”, deleted the whole mess and went to sleep, not thinking much more of it. My last name was not unique and many people have first names that start with “J”, so I’d encountered “accidental emails” before and I had responded, but I rarely heard back and, even when I did, it was just a “oops, sorry” and nothing more came of it (except for a few people that I kept as pen pals off and on through the years).
When I got up, however, and went back to my computer to process some of the business that I’d taken care of in LaLaLand, I found an email back from Roy, apologizing all over himself and hoping that he hadn’t offended me with the jokes. It was a very nice email, so I thought … hey, what the heck, I’ll email back and let him know that he was fine and that I promised not to complain about spamming or harassment or anything. He had stated that his friend’s wife had mistyped the email address and given mine instead, which is how it got sent incorrectly.
We started chatting back and forth. He was about 4 years divorced and living in Portland, Maine, about as far from me as he could possibly be since I was living in the San Francisco Bay Area. He is younger than me and has no children. He was working in the broadcasting industry. I was a stay-at-home mom of 3 (1 deceased by then and 2 still living) with an at-home business and in the process of a collapsing marriage and divorce. I didn’t expect or want anything. He didn’t expect or want anything, having just broken off with a prior girlfriend. We were the most unlikely match-up possible. There is no way possible we’d have met under any normal circumstances. It was “coincidence” that wasn’t “coincidence” since we don’t *BELIEVE* in “coincidence”. (Yes, I have a grammar no-no there on purpose and used the same word … GASP … 3 times in one sentence.) Anyway, we talked back-and-forth. We supported each other’s failures and understood one another’s hurts. We became friends online.
At the same time, my oldest son was in college in Vermont. I mentioned to him that I’d be going out for a parents’ weekend in April. He told me that it was only about 3 hours from where he lived and maybe he could meet us. That seemed fine to me … I mean … was the big ol’ mean man from Maine gonna get me when I was at a college parents’ weekend with my then 20 year old son? I found it pretty unlikely, even though my family and friends warned me about meeting some terrible stranger online and his family warned him about meeting some terrible California woman gone crazy.
And … we hit it off … he moved to California just 6 months after that … we figured we’d just remain good friends … no big deal … that’s all either of us wanted anyway … and if it worked out, fine and if it didn’t work out, well, no harm, no foul.
Guess what? On this November 23, 2012 (yes, we picked that date for a reason … look at the date in the 6th paragraph), we’ll be married 5 years … and it’ll be 10 years from the date of answering an “accidental email”.
Nope. We don’t believe in “coincidence”. Neither of us. Never have. Never will. There are plans out there bigger than us that change the course of lives.
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