"All the years combine, they melt into a dream"

I met Victoria in a couple group settings a little over 9 years ago, but it was on July 7, 1996 – nine years ago today that I first took a trip with her to the little apple pie town of Julian, about an hour from the outskirts of San Diego – and I would call this our first date and the beginning of our relationship. She had ran a personal ad in the San Diego Reader mentioning the books Steppenwolf (which I had related to when reading in college), and Frankenstein (which I had not read yet) – but the idea that a female in San Diego was actually mentioning a book at all to me in the personal ads I found to be very impressive. Looking back on it now, she was taking a chance on trusting someone she did not know to take her to a somewhat distant place, and her room mate Marlene later scolded her for that, but maybe her instincts told her I was pretty benign. I brought my guitar and sang to her for the first time in an area in the forest, which would have gone over better if the flies had not descended upon us both. On the way back we stopped at my office for some Tarot cards, and I picked one out for her at my home, and it happened to involved the “Hermit” card. This prompted her to want to hold me, and although that did not mean actually having sex, there was something about her that I knew was different than anyone I had been involved with before. I just felt completely at home with her – the more that I got to know her. Within the first couple months of dating her I was already talking about marrying her, which was a little soon for her, given her divorce, but I finally decided the best way to “reel her in” was to get her pregnant (okay – I didn’t really decide that, but it sounds good anyway). The reality is I am glad I did get her pregnant two years later, because that led to us finally getting married (I had been asking for years, but that seemed to finally seal it).

I am not going to say our 9 years have been easy. Victoria and I are very different in everything from culture to lifestyle, and there have been many clashes at times. In some ways we are the “Odd Couple”. There have been times when it appeared to be the end for certain. Somehow or another though, we have seen it through, with the help of a few marriage counselors along the way, and I know this relationship has been the most positive force in my life. With her I have seen myself move from a beat up little shack in San Diego, to owning my own modest house here in Nevada (even if it does resemble that bedroom shack at times). With her I have come out of living my own hermit life, to having my own small family and really feeling like I have a “home” to come home to, for the first time in my life.

Looking back on it now, I really feel like the day she entered my life, was the day my prayers were answered and I am very grateful to have her in my life, along with our own little family. The happiest years of my life have been with her.