Why did I get married? (Post Four)

I like Oprah and I try to watch her show every chance I get, but unfortunately every chance I get is usually only once or twice a month. Ryan usually wins out at this four o'clock hour. I give in and let him watch Blues Clues. That's the sacrifice I make so he is entertained while I make dinner.

Yesterday I watched the first 15 minutes or so of Oprah and her burning questions was "Why did you get married?" She interviewed several couples that had been married anywhere from less than a year to over ten years. I think thirteen was the max. Like I said I only managed to watch the first few minutes of the show and then I decided I needed to get up and do a few things around the house.

I have thought about her question and it has caused me to be a bit nostalgic.

Rourk and I have been married for thirteen years. We met in 1991. Quickly doing the math....we've known each other for sixteen years. We were both in college at the time. That would have been the summer before my senior year at UTM and Rourk would have been a junior at Tennessee Tech.

Yeah, I think that's right.

Marriage was not on my mind despite the fact that we met at a wedding. A friend of mine was marrying a friend of his and we were both attendants. I recall thinking that our friends were too young to get married and I didn't understand why they wanted to get married. I was dating and enjoying college and considering graduate school. I was going many different direction and it just wasn't time for me to think about settling down. I still thought marriage was for old people and I wasn't old.

My memories of that weekend are fading. (Talk about getting old.) But there is one in particular that is still vivid: I remember dragging the groom to Cadillacs. We had to drag him because going out to bars and drinking a few beers was not his thing. Cadillacs was a local bar in Martin, Tennessee that was a favorite of college students. (I wonder if it is still there? Twenty years ago the bricks on the back wall were leaning something fierce and looked as if they might crumble at any time. Yeah, it was joint. Complete with sticky floors, pool tables and stale smoke. ) I know the groomsmen were there and I know there was another girl with us, but she wasn't a bridesmaid. I remember talking to Rourk. I remember sitting on a bar stool, pretending to enjoy a beer and making small talk. I remember thinking Rourk was cute and nice and funny.

Is it strange that this memory stands out? I don't thinks so because even though I didn't know it at the time; those few hours spent at Cadillacs talking where our beginning. I have made that time significant because when I tell people about how we met it always starts at the wedding and whether or not I tell them about Cadillacs I always think about it. I believe that time was the most important moment of the weekend for me. Now it is anyway. It may even go down as one of the most important moments of my life. It is the story I'll share with Ryan and Lilly when one day they ask about how their mom and dad met.

I remember afterward the groom telling me that Rourk had asked if I was dating anyone.

I was.

It was an entire year before our paths would cross again.....

I know I still haven't answered Oprah's question, but I will.