This was originally posted on 10/3/11.
Mick and I celebrate our 1st anniversary
Today marks the 15th anniversary of my marriage to my partner in crime, Mick. We met through an online personal ad I placed in December 1996, and though I can’t find the text of the ad at the moment, I know I began it with Shakespeare’s sonnet #130:
My mistress’ eyes are nothing like the sun;
Coral is far more red than her lips’ red;
If snow be white, why then her breasts are dun;
If hairs be wires, black wires grow on her head.
If have seen roses damasked, red and white,
But no such roses see I in her cheeks;
And in some perfumes is there more deight
Than in the breath that from my mistress reeks.
I love to hear her speak, yet well I know
That music hath a far more pleasing sound;
I grant I never saw a goddess go;
My mistress when she walks treads on the ground.
And yet, by heaven, I think my love as rare
As any she belied with false compare.
Deep, huh? I thought so.
Within 48 hours, I received nearly 100 responses to that ad of mine. I only responded seriously to three or four. I remember one of them was an Indian fellow, and another was a single father of two children who was also a Christian minister.
What would my life have been if I had chosen one of them, I wonder?
Mick’s response to my ad stood out for its subtle humor, and I also liked that he was English (after all, I didn’t have much to go on at that point). I later found out he’d written it after a drunken night out with the boys. We talked on the phone the next day and met in person the next day.
For those of you who haven’t heard the story, my roommate and I were having a New Year’s Eve party and I invited Mick. He arrived some time after midnight and my first words to him in person were “Here, drink this quick,” as I held out a plastic glass filled with champagne. The date was January 1, 1997.
We’ve been more or less inseparable since that moment.
I don’t believe in soul mates and I don’t believe people are meant for each other in any cosmic sense. But I sure am glad my path crossed Mick’s and that we decided to merge our paths, because this life is damned good.