It is Valentine’s Day and I use this day to reminisce of how Chad and I became a couple. Was it fate, the stars or divine intervention. I tend to believe the third one.

I was in college and I have had a couple different boyfriends during those years. One ended quite odd. I dated a man I worked with in St Paul. I cared for him and I believe he did for me. We had some great times together. He took a vacation to visit his family in Mexico. I come to find out he went home to be married!!! How does that even happen? Needless to say it was a shock and that relationship was over. The next boyfriend we were friends before we dated. When I went away to New Mexico to college it occurred to me we weren’t a good match. I ended the relationship and decided I wanted to look for marriage not just fun and a date.

Here is the part of the story that isn’t conventional. My mom had told me that I should have an arranged marriage. She wants the best for me so she could find someone. HA!! that would happen when hell froze over. As a joke I grabbed a meeting people magazine, threw it at my mom and asked her to pick me a husband. Yes a magazine, I hate to say I am getting old. Match.com and things like that didn’t exist. Still had AOL dialup Internet.

Mom poured over the magazine and she picked 3 ads. I was surprised never expected her to even look at it. I secretly looked at the ads and kinda agreed. I wrote one letter to the mystery man. I told about being in college and our new puppy. I never told a soul that I wrote this letter.

Around this time we gained another piece of new age technology, caller ID. My dad was getting driven nuts by this ,Chad Lundquist, that kept calling our home. We were never there when he called and it was driving him crazy!!  Finally we were home and I talked to Chad on the phone. We just clicked. We talked for two hours non stop. I finally had to tell someone I wrote to a personal ad and we are talking. We talked numerous times. Finally met for dinner at Baker Square by Sunray Shopping Center. Then went to a movie with a friend of mine, she was also on a date. The night was great. Chad was a gentleman. He opened doors and pulled out chairs. He was slow to kiss me that took a couple months. It was so fun dating Chad. 13 months later we were engaged and 5 months later we were married. The story took off from there. In a few months we will celebrate 16 years of marriage. We have had our good times and plenty off of bad times. Never have I looked back from picking up that phone when the caller ID said Chad Lundquist.

I love you Chad.