Jackpot

I’m not sure how to lay any of this out or where to start, so perhaps I should start with the beginning, because to understand who DH is and what my life was like when WWW entered it is really quite important to the overall essence of where my life was at that time.

At the end of February 1998, I was going through a divorce with my first husband, “Mr. GQ.”   That month I moved in with my parents and began the process of rebuilding my life.  On April 28, two months later, my 58 year old mother unexpectedly passed away from a burst aneurysm in her heart that nobody knew was there.  Before I could even remotely recover from that shock, six months later in mid-October, my 63 year old father who was undergoing a serious, but routine bypass operation unexpectedly passed away due to complications of the bypass.   Initially my dad was in a coma, but we (my two sisters and I) maintained some hope that he would come back to us.   As the days wore on and tests were done it became clear that although the lights were on and my dad now had a smashingly good functioning heart, there was nobody home upstairs.  Ten days after his surgery we removed him off life support.   How I felt, what was going on, how I was dealing with all of that on top of a divorce is another story entirely that isn’t for this blog.  Suffice it to be that I was heartbroken and lost.  I felt like someone had taken the box that contained my life, shook it and dumped everything out onto the floor.  I was, however, slowly and with a lot of anxiety, patching my life back together into some new “normal.”   

One month before my dad passed away, I met the man who is now my DH.  I had no intention of seeking out a serious relationship then.  Are you kidding?  I was a mess.  I was casually dating and meeting a lot of people though.  I was trying to keep busy and involved.  I had not found anyone I was remotely interested in.  Our first date, was a blind date and I agreed to meet him for dinner at an Outback Steakhouse on a Thursday evening in September.  As is often the case, important things in one’s life can sneak up and smack you when you are least expecting it.  I was late for the date.  There was simply no fire under my ass about this.   I breezed into the lobby about 10 minutes late wondering if he’d left thinking he’d been stood up.  It was a bit awkward.  I stopped after I entered the double doors and turned to my left to look for him.  All I had was a picture of him and I saw a man I believed to be him, smile, stand up and walk my way.   It was that moment, that instant in time, a snap shot of five seconds or so, that changed me FOREVER.   

It wasn’t love at first sight.  I don’t believe in that hooey.   But it is a moment I can zero in on and that keeps coming back to me again and again.  As if the world was saying --->THIS <---  is your future.  And it was. 

DH had only met my dad two times before he died.  Very brief instances in which not much was said but pleasantries.  Our second date was the first time DH met my dad.   DH picked me up on a Saturday afternoon to take me to a chili cook off downtown.  DH walked up to the front door, which is not a door anyone who is familiar with my family uses or that anyone uses, ever.  Except perhaps annoying sales people and the like.   DH rang the doorbell and I let him in.  My father, who always had a tendency to be large, loud and over protective, was sitting in the kitchen reading the newspaper at the kitchen table.  He took one look at DH over his glasses and said “only enemies use the front door.”   I’m not sure my dad’s purpose in that if only to unnerve DH and take him off guard.  Which … yes, was exactly what he was doing now that I think about it.   DH to this day still talks about that moment and laughs.  It was the only real one-on-one moment they ever had where my dad’s personality truly made an appearance.   No pleasantries there, just a somewhat humorous though very real warning one man to another.   Given the hell I had been recently going through, my dad wasn’t giving any man the benefit of the doubt.  YET. 

When my dad’s bypass went into the shitter, I called DH to let him know what happened.  I was at the hospital with a close family friend.  My older sister had children at home and left the hospital already.  My other sister lived across the country so it was just me.  DH lived 45 minutes away, but came immediately.  Long story short, from that moment DH was by my side whenever he was needed.  He stayed with me at the hospital and even talked to my dad when he was in a coma.  It was sweet.  When my dad died, he shuttled around family members and got gas in our cars, he picked people up from the airport and did so many other things to assist that my sisters became squinty eye’d with suspicion.  No man is THAT good.  My older sister insisted there was something “wrong with him.”   She didn’t trust him and believed that he was the type who was probably preying on my vulnerability. Both sisters together practically held an intervention about it, insisting that I shouldn’t trust him.   It was the last thing I needed.  I understood what they were saying but what was I supposed to do?  He had done nothing to indicate that he wasn’t sincere.  When the funeral was over and EVERYONE went back to their lives and my sisters, their husbands and their children went back to theirs, I was left to float about my childhood home like a ghost completely alone.   I felt like an island.  When DH realized this, he insisted I pack my bags and for at least the next week stay with him.  Which I did. 

The man that I just described is the man that DH truly is.  Someone who will give you the shirt off his back if you ask, who will assist whenever it’s needed.  He cries at sappy movies, more than I do!  He feels deeply.  The first time I saw him he looked like a pirate.  Deeply tan, with dark eyes and sandy blonde hair with and tiny hoop in his left ear.  But it was his smile that did it.  A wide smile with nice straight teeth and the crowning glory that is his face?  Two little dimples that lit up on either side of his smile.  He paid attention to my every switching mood at the time.  If I so much as sighed, he wanted to know what I was thinking.  He was not the predator my sisters painted him to be.  He really was THAT good.  His day job is working in a laboratory (did I mention that he’s also like genius smart?).  He also was (and still is) a part-time paid first responder and fire fighter.  Literally the man who runs into burning buildings and saves kittens.   He appeared financially sound, had never been married, and had no children.  He had a truck for daily use and summer time only Corvette with T-tops.  His owned his own home that looked like the Gingerbread house. It was an early century cottage, with darling little pointy peeked roofs, a bay window and well-kept front yard.  Isn’t that ridiculous? 

What did I have to complain about?  I found Mr. Perfect.  I.hit.the.fucking.jackpot. 

But it couldn’t be that good could it.  Because I think the better they are, the blemish that you do eventually find will often be big one.  And that big one is WWW.