How I Met The Man Of My Dreams






I began chatting online late August of 1997. A few weeks later, I happen upon the Counting Crows chatroom. I met a lot of people in there. One of the chatters I met, sometime in October, went by the username Merlin. We talked for a little while.

I started coming back to the CC chat many times. I found myself getting hooked. Which is very easy to do! Most of the time Tony, aka Merlin, would be in there. I found I could talk to him very naturally. There are a lot of people online that you aren't too sure about. But something was different about him. We became best of friends. We would talk for hours almost every night. Sometimes I didn't want the night to end.

We started chatting privately on ICQ. We also started talking to each other on the phone. The more we chatted the more we found ourselves being more than just friends. Course it was hard for me at first of the idea of meeting someone online. That concept was a little hard for me to comprehend. Not to mention he is 11 years older than I am. We had seen pictures of each other but hadn't met in person. Sometime in January I found myself reading those 3 words that Tony had written me. "I love you." Whoa! I was taken back for a moment. I didn't know how to react. Well, I didn't give him the same response back. I was still confused about my feelings.

But I eventually came around. In my heart I knew I had the same feelings. It got to the point where I had to "be" with him every night.

In May of 1998, I flew out to North Carolina to see Tony for a week. To see if our relationship was meant to be. I was a bit nervous to actually see him in person. I almost didn't recognize him when I got off the plane. Tony was a perfect gentleman. Even got me roses and chocolate kisses. He took me to Atlantic Beach. I had a wonderful time with him. It was very hard at the end of the week to get on the plane.

After that trip, I just knew that Tony was the man I was going to marry. We continued to talk almost every night online. In October of '98, Tony came out to California to see me. There was one small problem with this. My parents had no clue about Tony. I thought they would be furious about my meeting people online and then in person. They didn't even know about my trip to the East Coast. I finally told my mom and didn't get the response I expected. She seems ok with it. Course I think she was still in shock!

Tony came out to CA for a week. He met my parents and they absolutely loved him! Course my mom loves the fact that Tony knows a thing or two about computers. I would hope so since he is a computer engineer! Anyway, now I really knew everything was going to work out. I spent the whole week he was in CA, touring him all over the northern part of the state. He had never been to CA before. Saying goodbye to him after that week was harder than my leaving NC. But we both knew on our hearts that we would be together again someday.

By now, our love for each other had grown so much. I ached to be near him so I could feel his arms around me and hear his voice. I had planned a trip to NC in Feb of '99. There was no way I was going to spend Valentine's day alone. Tony and I had talked about marriage before. And I knew he was going to propose to me on Valentine's day. The whole day I kept thinking to myself, "When is he going to propose to me?" That night, we had a wonderful candlelight dinner at home (that Tony fixed, oh boy can he cook!) :-) He seemed a little nervous for some reason. After dinner he got down on one knee and asked me to marry him. I of course responded with "Of course I will!" That was one of the happiest days of my life.

But that glorious week had to come to an end. And once again, I found myself having to say goodbye. I remember holding on to him at the airport, tears welling up in my eyes, not wanting that moment to end. But it did.

But than in June of '99, Tony flew out to CA to help me pack. We piled as much as we could into my little car and set out to begin the journey of our new lives together. We drove cross country (in a week!) stopping along the way to see my aunt in Colorado and my cousin in Missouri. October 16, 1999, Tony and I got married.


Feel free to take a look at the page the two of us have put together, celebrating our love.




Tony & I in June 1999