When I met my boyfriend Chris, he wasn’t what I thought of as my “type.” He skateboarded and went to punk shows, didn’t like the Magnetic Fields or Yo La Tengo (I listened to them heavily back then), and would never wear a sweater. I thought that if I could expect anything of a boyfriend, it’d be what I considered obvious: he’d wear wool, and jam to Stephin Merritt. Still, I adored Chris the first time I met him—and every time after—because he was just the “type” of person I wanted to know. He was funny and kind, soft-spoken and clever; plus, he had the most adorable dimples.
It turns out that Chris and I have nearly identical personalities, yet there’s a big enough wedge between our interests to make it so we’re not like the episode of Seinfeld where Jerry meets Janeane Garofalo and everything about them is so much the same that they end up hating each other. We’re both shy introverts and we both like The Office, but Chris hates my olives and I hate his bologna.
Our first real date was to the North Carolina Zoo in Asheboro because we both love animals, and we went there again the next year for our anniversary. We moved into an apartment seven months later, and are still here after three years and five months. That brings us to five exact years of growing older and more ridiculous together. When it’s chilly in the morning, Chris reminds me to take a sweater. When he fell skateboarding and sprained his wrist, I fed him shreds of ginger root “to help with inflammation” and he didn’t even protest. When I get sick, he brings me medicine. When he gets sick, I won’t even know what to do because I have never seen him sick. (He had a runny nose, once.) We make dinner together and share trash duty. He likes to vacuum. I like… not having to vacuum.
Soooo, I bring you exciting news item #1!
On October 13th, my skater-dude boyfriend became my brand-new husband. We had a very small ceremony to please all six guests who attended, and spent our honeymoon in a little cabin near the Great Smoky Mountains National Park. It was a wonderful wedding and vacation. I don’t really talk much about relationship stuff, but I think it’d be appropriate to use the word “perfect” to describe how things have been going.
In order to avoid descending into name-tattoo territory, let me just show you pictures.
oh, congratulations! :) I love the idea of having a little, intimate ceremony, I’m so glad you enjoyed yours :)
Congratulations, Jackie!
I loved my wedding, but I gotta say I’m a little jealous of a) the simplicity and b) the frakin’ SCENERY of your ceremony. GSM is the greatest national park in the country. At least in my book.
Also: all wedding kiss pictures are inherently cute – but yours trumps most.
Thank you both! It was definitely a beautiful day.
Matt, my mom says that Chris and I look alike (I don’t know if I agree—I know we both have some noses), so I’m hoping nobody ever sees us kissing and gets grossed out by our relationship ;]
OMG. Congrats. :)