2 posts tagged “metachat”

MetaChat is doing a bunny exchange.  This is my first attempt.  All-in-all I think he turned out pretty cute, but I'm actually going to give this one to the mister.  There are changes I want to make before I start sending out bunnies such as longer ears and arms.

The plant is a kalanchoe and the photo is of my maternal grandmother in 1922.  She was two years old.

Stuffed Bunny No. 1

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May 15, 1999 I bought a computer and went online for the first time. A couple days later I gathered up my courage to check out a chat-room (MSNs long (un)dead ComicChat). The #newbies room looked like a good bet and I nervously entered the room. The warm welcome was overwhelming. I quickly made new friends some of whom are friends to this day.

I'm not sure when I first started talking to this dude who went by the nick of Eli (I was RedFern, by the way). But by July we were playing Quake2 with a bunch of other chat buddies and I thoroughly enjoyed fragging his, and everyone else's, ass. We'd "whisper" back and forth to each other in #newbies and started having long conversations on ICQ. Four hour conversations. Along about September we exchanged phone numbers and the four hour conversations continued.

By the end of September we knew we wanted to meet, but let me digress a bit:

I had decided in Spring of 1999 that I would move to Seattle the following Spring. I had a dreadful vision of being in the same place (Texas) doing the same job (loan underwriter) for the same company (a S&L) 40 years down the line. It was horrifying.

Back to Eli and RedFern:

So, we wanted to meet but we didn't want to wait until Spring 2000. I checked with my brother in Seattle to see if I could move up my move date (I was going to stay with him while I got a job, an apartment, etc.) and he said he'd be glad to have me sooner. I gave notice to my employer saying that my last day would be just before Thanksgiving. That gave me almost a month to get packed and moved to Seattle by mid December (to fund all of this I cashed out my 401k).

I then had to get up the nerve to tell my mum that I had met this guy on the internets and was moving to Seattle. (FYI: we both worked for the same company and were based in their San Antonio location.) She took it better than I thought she would; mum's can surprise you.

My brother flew down (at my expense) to help me load up the UHaul truck I had rented and drive to Seattle. (It was nice to spend the time with my older bro. He's nine years older than me and moved to Seattle when I was in my mid-teens. We hadn't really gotten to know each other very well, so the year I lived with him was great.)

We arrived in Seattle on December 17 and Eli drove down from Canada on the 18th to help us unload the truck and get me set up at my bro's place. I was so nervous I truly thought I would throw up. He rang the doorbell and I answered and we stood there looking at each other like a couple half-wits. He finally came in and we kissed hello. I became a shameless hussy that night.

We commuted back and forth over the border for just under a year. We were both worn out emotionally from being apart so much and decided we wanted to live together in Canada. Well, Canadian Immigration said that it wasn't quite that easy and it would be easier if we got married. Neither of us were exactly in the marrying mood. Eli had been divorced less than a year (I wasn't exactly the rebound gal. He had a short, non-intimate, relationship in between his ex-wife and myself. And that's a story in itself. My married brother got intimately involved with the same woman.). And I had decided long ago that I would never get married.

We were told this by CIC on Sunday and we were married the next Saturday (December 2). We didn't tell anyone and I don't think my mum or brother will ever forgive us for that.

I adore my mister and have yet to understand why someone like him would marry someone like me. I'm just lucky, I guess.

Cross posted here.