Meeting.

(Part Four (?) in a series of answers to questions you asked. Feel free to ask your OWN question, too!)

Bad Mummy said, “I’d love to hear how you and Coffee met!”

The short answer is that we met on the internet.

The longer answer, the one that explains the meeting and the falling in love and the part where we ended up married, is a bit more complicated.

Somewhere in the late ’90s, Coffee lived in California (and a few other places) and I lived in Toronto. Through mutual friend(s) we were introduced, began corresponding via email and through IRC, and developed one of those online-style friendships. I was living with my boyfriend at the time and neither Coffee nor I considered our online friendship to be anything more than that: friendship.

We say “mutual friend(s)” because neither one of us remembers who it was that actually introduced us. We frequented some of the same newsgroups and hung out in IRC, as I noted, but we can’t remember our first real contact; it was likely something very, very small and insignificant. Since we weren’t flirting or building a relationship, there wasn’t a lot of deep feeling and meaning behind every word we wrote on the screen.

Fast forward a few years and I was married and living in Hamilton. Coffee was still in California. He mentioned that he wanted to take a break from his job to give some thought toward his future. I suggested that he come to Canada and stay with me. My home had a nearly-empty 3rd floor with a bedroom and a bathroom and he was welcome to stay there rent-free ’til he figured out what he wanted to do.

He decided to take me up on that offer. At that point, we had never spoken on the phone. We had exchanged one, maybe two (?), pictures. But I was pretty sure Coffee wasn’t a serial killer. He started looking into the cost of traveling and eventually booked a bus ticket for a few weeks in the future. All good.

Meanwhile, my husband and I were having problems. I won’t go through the whole list of them here, but the biggest was his refusal to spend time with me (and his ability to find 400 other things he “needed” to do), so suffice it to say that I was giddy at the idea of having someone else with whom to hang out. Again, not in a flirty way.

Another friend, from the UK, had stayed with us for almost a year and it was wonderful – so I didn’t see any issue with Coffee staying. Neither did my husband. We had the space, and it wasn’t being used, so it was all good.

On the day that Coffee arrived, I left work a bit early to pick him up at the bus station. I helped him load his trunk and bag and computer parts into my car and then we drove home making awkward conversation. (Ha!) I thought he was wickedly attractive, yes, but I also knew he had his own issues and I had my marriage and I wasn’t going to start flirting or anything. How awkward would THAT be for him?!

Over the next few months, as my husband spent more and more time locked in his office playing flight simulations on his computer, I spent more and more time with Coffee. We played Tetris, went grocery shopping, and generally hung out together. My husband didn’t care – at all – even when I noted that I was spending more time with my friend than I was with my husband. He knew I wasn’t cheating on him so I guess he figured it was okay if someone else handled my emotional needs.

Then my Dad died. I took a leave of absence from work to handle his estate, and all the shit that surrounded that, and Coffee was there the whole time. He came with me to appointments and he distracted me from my grief and.. my husband didn’t. My husband just continued to fade out.

And Coffee was there as my friend. I joke that I started to fall in love with him because he kept the fridge stocked with diet Coke for me – but it was more that I really, really appreciated his kindnesses. The fact that he wasn’t my boyfriend, or my husband, but he was attentive and kind and sweet as a friend.

One day, as I emerged from my grief, I looked around and realized that my marriage was over – that it had, in fact, been over pretty much since the day it started. We had different goals and different plans and, hell, I really thought it’d be fun to be married to someone who wanted to spend time in the same room as me! I wasn’t picturing Coffee, or anyone else, but I knew I wasn’t going to be with my husband for much longer.

I didn’t want to leap into a divorce, though. I wanted to make sure it wasn’t a reaction to my grief. I wanted to give everything a chance to level out a bit. I tried talking to my husband and explaining my feelings and worries and.. nada.

(The amusing part is that the friend from the UK had repeatedly asserted that my marriage wasn’t going to work out – over the course of the year that he lived with us he observed our interactions and our differing priorities and wondered why the hell we got married in the first place! I had disagreed over and over and.. oops.)

Coffee and I decided while playing Tetris late one night that we’d take a road trip – to visit a friend in Idaho – using money that I’d inherited from my father. My Dad had always talked about how travel was really important but he died before he got the chance to do much of it. The plan grew to include a visit to BC. Then a friend in California. Then the Grand Canyon. It was exciting to consider.

When we figured out the plan, we told my husband our idea and suggested that he come along (obviously!). He said he had no interest but that we should go and have fun.

We suggested he come with us just to BC and then he could fly home. He shook his head.

We told him we’d likely be gone for several weeks and.. no dice. He was fine staying home. Go ahead! Have fun!

So we did.

Coffee and I got in the car and drove around for almost five weeks. And we had a hell of a good time in Canada and the US and visited some mutual friends and some of my friends. We hit up some touristy places and camped out in a friend’s field and it was one of the best five weeks of my entire life.

When I returned home again, I realized my marriage was absolutely, positively, 100% finished. Over. Done. I had time away to consider things, to be away from the ‘situation’, and I realized I didn’t want to start that again.

(I’ll skip over the crap that went along with telling my husband that the marriage was over and then the legal shit that went on for the next few years. But I will say: GET A PRENUP, PEOPLE.)

And I also realized that I was madly in love with Coffee. Not smitten, not infatuated, not lusting.. in full-on, no holds barred LOVE.

At some point, I sent him an email (yes, an email) that basically said, “I do not want to freak you out. I do not want to make you uncomfortable. I do not want you to run screaming but.. I think I love you.”

He did not get freaked out. He was not uncomfortable. He did not run screaming.

He thought he loved me, too.

Holy crap.

I was ending my marriage and then I was separated and then I was divorced and, through all of it, Coffee was a constant. My best friend and, in time, my boyfriend. And then my fiance and then we got married. And he’s still my best friend. My constant.

So we did meet on the internet, really, but not through a dating site and not with the intention of dating. We didn’t even flirt. :)