LOL No, it was not love at first sight for me. Him, maybe. As it was Thanksgiving eve, and everyone else was home thawing their turkeys, it was only he and I and his friend in the coffee shop, including all the outside tables. His friend spotted me coming in and made some comment to DH, who made a beeline for counter where I was ordering.
At this time, I worked in a short term, inpatient rehab facility for the homeless mentally ill--you know--those people talking to themselves on the street or panhandling to get money for drugs. At the time of our meeting, the rehab facility had this big guy as a patient who was the neediest human being I had ever met--major league dependent. When DH came swooshing up behind me, I turned, and at first glance, I thought he was the dependent guy--not a good first impression.
He asked me how I was, and I replied when the pro forma fine. I sort of felt obligated to ask him how he was and he replied "Charmed". DH is really good at flattering smack talk with people in line. He regularly melts the hearts of cashiers with compliments. So I got my coffee and went to a table outside. A minute later he appears and asks to join me. We talk over coffee and I am still pretty neutral about him. He could hear the traces of my original Arkansas accent so he is trying to pull up his grandparent's old Tennessee ways to establish a common ground. At that time, I hated my southern background, so I was kind of negatively impressed, if not down right grossed out.
When I get ready to leave, he asks for my phone number and I wouldn't give it to him. Eh, I have to study for a licensing exam and that is going to take every non working minute for the next six months...... Most people would be discouraged by a response that is is the equivalent of "I can't go out with you because I have to wash my hair three times a day for the rest of my life", but DH, being a salesman knew how to deal with rejection. He gave me his card and said Call me in 6 months when you get past your exam.
At this point I had just been in CA about a year. A few weeks earlier, the biggest narcissist in the world and I had just mutually dumped each other. On Thanksgiving day, I was a bit lonely and had a lot of time before the late Thanksgiving dinner I was invited to. Since I was on a coffee relapse after a year of a health food regime, eating stuff like wheatgrass, I thought to myself, well he was ok... so I called him and invited him to me meet me for coffee.....As I said, coffee addicts meet in coffee shops. He had a 6 latte a day habit back then.
Fast forward, our first date was pretty bad... Saw Steel Magnolias and had dinner and lame conversation. There probably would not have been a second date if I had not needed someone to drive me back home after oral surgery. Yes--our second date was he took me to the dentist. Most people have to work during the day, but as a salesman, he was master of his own schedule. I was impressed that he was on time to pick me up. And I remember thinking as we drove the 40 minutes to the oral surgeon that things were easy and comfortable between us. The conversation was good. Then he caught me when I fainted after the oral surgery. Nice move. That date kind of got him in the game. My mother came for Christmas and he put the full charm offensive on her. I was impressed he could charm my slightly thorny mother. I thought this guy has some skills.
Then in about March I let a girlfriend stay in my apartment for a week when her home sale closed and her next home purchase was delayed a week. i stayed with him. We got along. Then June we were engaged. He says I decided we were getting married. I don't exactly remember it that way, but I also don't remember him asking me. I liked it that he let me shop for my own ring and call him to come pay for it when I found it. ha ha That is probably the prototype for our marriage. When we got engaged, I never thought we would get married, but I didn't think we wouldn't either. I just thought, we are engaged and if nothing goes wrong, we will get married. Talk about one day at a time. I did like throwing around the term "my fiancee". So much better than "my husband."
We got married in October about eleven months after our meeting. (Later on, his mother told me that we got married on his parents anniversary--weird coincidence.) Since we had both been married before, we didn't want a big wedding. In fact we wanted no guests at all, which really ticked his college age daughter off. On our wedding day, we picked our clothes out of our closet. I was married in a $10 embroideried white cotton Mexican shirt and skirt. We had a rent a minister. We snuck into a meditation garden over looking the ocean. The hindu facility let people in to mediate but did not allow weddings as people trample their flowers--so we had a 3 person standing meditation that just happen to sound a lot like wedding vows. The grounds keepers saw what was going on and kindly turned off their leaf blowers as we had our 3 minute wedding over the koa pond. The wedding was zero stress. And here we are all these years later.
So that is how we slid into being married. One day at a time. We get along so well. We enjoy the same things and have the same tastes. We both have Scottish ancestors and suspect we are probably 5th cousins or something like that as we are so similar.
We spent the morning watching large guys carry all of my stuff up 3 flights of stairs, the afternoon taking outdoor furniture, tools, etc. to the garden, then I puttered around unpacking while the BF took the small rental van back and he brought back carryout as we hadn't eaten all day. 
