A Love Story

Today is my wedding anniversary. I've been married 4 years. It seems like yesterday that I was meeting my online semi-blind dates in a candlelit corner of the Gypsy Den coffee shop, in search of my true love. In honor of today I'm going to tell the story of how we met.

I was freshly out of a 6-month relationship with Izak, a guy I'd met on Yahoo personals. He was sweet, fun, and non-committal. I knew he wasn't husband material after he wondered aloud (in my presence) if he'd be single at 40. Thanks, buddy. So I ended that and decided to give up the online search and let fate take its course without any help from me or my computer. When I logged on to delete my Yahoo profile, a pop-up window for Lavalife appeared. This was the picture I saw:



I loved this artsy little ad, it's raining men! Perhaps I was just using the wrong online service? I clicked the link and did a basic search. I checked the box that said "profiles with pictures only" and it came up with 40 or so matches. All but one had a picture. It caught my eye because I wondered how it got in the bunch, and then I noticed his tag line: I'm Insane, Actually. Of course I had to pursue this... is he really nuts? But people that are crazy don't exactly know they're crazy, or don't advertise it... right? I was immediately intrigued. And then his next words. Oh, those perfect next words. Here is what Rhys wrote on his Lavalife profile~ August 25th, 2003:

"I'm insane, actually. My favorite activities include measuring your digits to see if they're in golden proportion to one another, dining in (how about fresh salmon with a ginger-teriyaki glaze topped with fresh mango cilantro black mustard salsa, feta and mache salad, homemade carrot cake for dessert?), a great bottle of wine, and a not often heard combination of Radiohead, Shostakovich and Miles Davis. Why not? Life is good. I mean, I understand what all the confusion is about. I really do! I just don't feel like being confused. I'd rather be wise and happy and fruitful. I'd rather be a good husband, a good father, a good person. There are too many boys and girls out there playing their little games, hurting one another, hurting their kids, hurting the world around them. I hate games. Why should love be so complicated and painful! You don't have to be perfect. You just have to know who you are."

Game over. There's my husband.

Now here's where it gets even better: the night I logged on was the very night he created and posted his profile. We'd found each other within hours. And somehow he found his way to me even without a profile picture. I paid $1.50 for 5 credits to email him, and by the next day we were both off of Lavalife.

We emailed like crazy and talked on the phone for hours. All the while I'd never seen what he looked like. But I didn't care, this was my German husband. After a week he finally borrowed a camera and sent me a picture, and I was elated. He fit into my "perfect physical features" category, I couldn't believe it. I half expected him to be 50 and obese, but I was ready for it. But no, an angel with white blond hair. Who plays the violin. Who can cook really well. Who's apartment was cleaner than mine.

For our first date, I drove to his house and I even left my online dating mace at home. I've never been so sure of anything in my life. I told the girls at work "See ya later, I'm off to meet my German husband." That night, towards the end of our 10-hour first date, we danced to Chet Baker's "This is Always." I made the decision in that moment that we would dance at our wedding to that same song. A year later we were engaged, 9 months after that we were married. And to this day, there is nothing I'm more sure of than this decision I made to spend the rest of my life with Rhys Buchele.

Here is a little slide show of wedding highlights I put together for our anniversary.
I love, love you, my German husband... you are a good husband, good father, good person.

**Scroll down to the very bottom of the page and hit the Pause button on the Playlist, before playing the slide show**