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Laura and I met Memorial Day Weekend, 2009. I went to college with a girl named Lindsay who invited me and my best friend Jonathan over that Friday night for a small get together at her house in West Paterson, NJ. I had just graduated with a degree in Accounting two weeks earlier. Laura was going to Pace University in NYC but agreed to hang out in New Jersey that night. She was under the impression it was going to be a girl’s night and they would go out dancing but Lindsay obviously made other plans for all of us to hang out in her basement!
I didn’t know Laura personally yet but knew of her via mutual friends and social media. She will tell you that I was rude when we got to Lindsay’s house because I didn’t introduce myself and say hi. Maybe that’s true, I was probably arrogant. Either way, we ended up hanging out that night and having a blast. I actually tried to hook her up with Jonathan (they were both Dominican and I thought it’d be a home run) but obviously, that didn’t happen!
Memorial Day Weekend in NJ and in the US in general, is pretty much the start of the summer. Everyone typically goes down to the Jersey Shore for the weekend since Monday is a holiday and there is no work or school that day. My parents actually lived down the shore so before leaving Lindsay’s house on Friday night we all decided that we would head down for the weekend and stay at my parents’ house. My parents didn’t know this yet, but they’ve always enjoyed company! My friend Jonathan and I lived together at the time so we literally went home, packed a bag and drove straight down to South Jersey in the middle of the night (I didn’t want to hit traffic!). Everyone else met us down there Saturday morning.
Two days after we met in real life, walking around a grey and cold Stockholm, drinking coffee and talking for hours, that’s when we understood that both of us were in the exact situation in life, deceived and betrayed only 2 months earlier. Not really able to meet someone new, we were messed up.
We spent Saturday at the boardwalk and went back to my parents’ house that night. We had some drinks, played some games and had a real deep conversation, between all of us, about life. Laura and I actually had some conflicting beliefs but I think this was the first glimpse of how well we communicate with each other, even in disagreement. Communication is everything in a great relationship. The night went well and everyone drove back up to North Jersey that Sunday. On Monday a friend of mine had a Memorial Day barbeque and I invited all of them to come hang out again.
From that weekend on, Laura and I built our friendship and ended up “officially” becoming a couple on her birthday in November of 2009. 9 years later, for our Memorial Day Weekend 2018 anniversary, I proposed and as of October 3rd, 2018 we are married!