Living Outside the Stacks

Happy Anniversary: How I Met My Husband {In the Family Room}

Today, the hubs and I are celebrating 19 years of marriage, so I thought it’d be fun to share the story of how I met my husband…

The year was 1994, and I was a sweet, innocent little soldier stationed at Fort Polk, Louisiana, about to celebrate my 2nd year in the Army. This is my story, I can tell it any way that I like, just rest assured that what I’m telling you is the whole truth.  Anyway, I was sitting in the personnel office updating some paperwork, when I see these two guys in a separate part of the office looking at me.  I acknowledged them and kept on talking.  And by acknowledged, I mean, I glared at them and shifted in my chair because they were staring at me.  So I finished my business, said good bye to everyone and started heading out of the office when I felt a tap on my shoulder.

I turned to see one of the guys who was staring at me.  ”My friend would like to ask you out.”  I looked him up and down ~ you know that look we give trifling men ~ and said “Tell your friend if he wants to ask me out, step to me like a man and ask me himself.”  Then I walked away. I later found out that the hubs never asked his friend to say anything to me, the guy just thought he was doing his friend a solid.  I also found out that he’d called his mother and told her that he saw his future wife.  Ummmm, yeah, right….  Actually, I guess he was right.  Hahaha After that, I started seeing my future husband everywhere.  So much so that I seriously thought he was stalking me.

The future hubs started coming to the mailroom to pick up mail for this female soldier which irritated me to no end.   I was thinking, wait, wasn’t this man just trying to pick me up the other day?  Whatevs… I had a baby at home, I wasn’t in the mood for any foolishness.  I didn’t bother dealing with him, I had neither the patience nor the time.  Turns out, the girl he was picking mail up for was a single mother who was home convalescing and he was just helping out.

Now I have to break right here to give you a little bit of background…  At the time, I was in charge of the Unit Mailroom and I had about 3 male soldiers working for me, who used to always have their buddies at the mailroom, so there were always vehicles parked behind my office.  However, no one ever parked in my parking space.  Ever. I’m very territorial about my parking spaces, ask anyone who has ever worked with me.

Now back to the story…

Skip ahead a few weeks later, and I pulled into the back of my office and saw this beautiful black Isuzu Rodeo parked in my parking spot. *insert side eye* The windows were down, the music was blaring…it was just begging to be explored.  So I got out of my car, hopped in the truck and started looking around.  Yes, seriously. My parking space, my rules. I had no idea who this truck belonged to but I was going through everything ~ the cds, AC/DC, really? the glove box, etc.  I would never recommend doing such a thing now but I was bold back in the day.  And I was fairly certain that I was safe because I was working under the assumption that the truck belonged to one of my soldier’s friends.  Anyway, I was sitting in the driver’s seat when who should come walking out but Mr. Helpful.  He walked over to the truck with this big ol’ cheese eating grin on his face, leaned in to the window and said: “My name is Sergeant Tucker and I don’t have any money ’cause you’re sitting in it.”  Swoon.  Yep, it was his truck.

And that, my friends, is the story of how I met my husband.

If you’d like to read what happened when I stood up him up on our first date, go here.  I’ll tell you this much, it involves a stalled car on a dark secluded highway, a trucker and a very forgiving man. cue Hotel California…