Yesterday I was chatting with Elena Stowell, co-founder of the Carly Stowell Foundation , about the baby, relationships and I ended up telling her how Jason and I met.
I thought it might be kind of fun to take everyone back to the beginning to see how my own family got started.
Jason and I went to Interlake High School together. He was a year ahead of me. Freshman year we were both in Mr. Michael’s first-year algebra class. We also had biology together with Mr. Witt first semester. I remember thinking even then that he was cute in a tall, geeky kind of way.
Sophomore year he sat behind me in Mr. Rasmussen’s geometry class. He would wear shorts in the winter, played clarinet in Wind Ensemble, and never did his math homework. He got a C because he aced the tests. I got a C because he helped me with my homework while I barely managed to pass the tests. I’m pretty sure I fell head over heels in love with him when I was 15.
It just took me a while to figure that out.
Junior year I asked him to fall tolo (that’s the modern name for ‘Sadie Hawkins dance’). I had been soundly rejected by another boy and just wanted to go have fun. Jason had just been dumped by his first girlfriend and was the worst date ever. During dinner he talked about her non-stop, analyzing the relationship, dissecting it in that left-brained, logical way he has about him. Now, once we got to the dance and the music played, we had a great time. No pressure, we were both nursing bruised egos. That night remained in my memory.
About a year later, Jason was home for Thanksgiving. He was at the school for some reason while I was there for basketball practice. I didn’t play, I was the statistician/manager/gym rat who spent all my time with the girls team because I loved being around them even when school wasn’t in session. I remember walking toward the gym entrance and Jason was standing by his dad’s old red and silver Chevy van, a college boy now attending Montana State University, looking tall and handsome.
But, I was dating someone at the time.
Over Christmas break I bumped into him again, we exchanged contact information.
A couple months later, about three days after that guy I was dating dumped me unceremoniously an hour before a dance he was supposed to attend with me, I received a letter from Jason.
From there the letters turned into calls. Shortly before he finished his first year of college, I sent him a letter asking him to my senior prom, primarily because after my last relationship I decided to swear off guys. I just wanted to go with a friend and I knew after the last dance we went to that we could have fun together. Perfect.
It took a little arm twisting, but he agreed.
We doubled with my best friend Mike, who went with our friend JP (short for Jenifer Park), and had dinner at Red Robin on the pier then danced away on the Spirit of Puget Sound.
Jason and I ended up talking most of the time. By the end of the night we were holding hands. Later, I took everyone home in my 1983 Toyota Corolla, returning Jason last. I told him I’d call him the next day.
It took me all day to work up the nerve to call him. But, I did, around 7 p.m. He was dying to get out of the house. His little brother, David, who was 12 at the time was driving him nuts. So, we went to a movie, maybe had dinner.
That was May 26, 1996. We have been together ever since. We got married May 26, 2000.
We went through two years of long distance while I was at Gonzaga and he was at Montana State. I eventually transferred to the University of Washington. We got engaged when I was 19 and married when I was 21.
People thought we rushed into it but we did wait four years from our first date. We *were* young. And I wouldn’t recommend it to anyone. You have to be a little crazy to get married at any age, but, especially that age. I wouldn’t change any of it, though.
We talked early on about kids, decided we wanted them someday and at most, we’d have two.
Now, here we are, 13 1/2 years after we started dating and 9 1/2 years since we got married having our first child.
It’s amazing to me how far we’ve come. I told him a few months ago that he’s been there for all the best days in my life: graduation from high school, graduation from college, the day we got married, the day we found out I was pregnant, the day we found out we were having a girl.
And soon, he’ll be there for the next best day of my life, the day our daughter is born.
Never would I have guessed that tall, quiet, cute, geeky boy who sat behind me in geometry class would become my husband and father of my child but I would have it no other way. He’s the love of my life and soon our little girl will be the light of our life.
And the best is yet to come!