How I met my wife, part 1 — Meeting my second love

So a few years ago, I was thinking about what transpired to make me the person I am today, and how things work to open your eyes to the people you meet, and eventually to the person who matters the most to you. I started thinking back to the events that led to me meeting my wife, and realized that it goes back quite a ways, and includes events in my life that I never would have imagined would lead to me meeting my wife.

This is the story of those events, and it’s a long one, so I’m breaking it up into several installments.

It begins in the first grade (I know, right? first grade!).

I was in the first grade and I had been doing very well with my studies (studies? like what, drawing horseys?), and was doing so well, that they decided to move me up a grade, right in the middle of the year. So I guess the story also begins in the second grade. Anywho… on with the story…

My family (consisting of me, my mom, and my little brother), moved from an apartment in Salt Lake City, to a house in Magna when I was in the third grade (but I thought you said this story begins in the first grade?  Well, it does, and we’ll get to that in a moment.)  We had moved into a small neighborhood, with a few kids, but not many.

One day, shortly after moving, I was riding my bike down the street, and there were some kids about my age throwing a tennis ball back and forth across the street. Naturally, kids being kids, and boys being more so, they threw the ball at me. I, of course, didn’t really like this, and thought that these kids were being mean to me, and went home. Later on (possibly that same day, I don’t remember), I met these kids again, and not sure what exactly happened, but contrary to what you might think, we hit it off very well. One of the kids in particular (Angel), became one of my best friends all throughout the remainder of elementary, jr. high (middle school, for those not familiar), and high school.

Angel, and his brother Jose, were two of the three kids that threw the tennis ball at me, and the three of us were pretty much inseparable from that point on. Jose was a couple years older than we were (Angel and I were in the same grade, and this is why skipping a grade in early elementary is important to the story, as I don’t think they would have been as important in my life if we hadn’t been in the same grade), but we were always together, all the time.

Fast forward about 6–7 years, the three of us were still inseparable, but we were older now, and all of our fun activities went from playing in the street, or playing Nintendo, to doing things at night. Because, for some reason, things that you do as a teenager, even if they don’t require darkness, seem so much more fun at night.

We always went to various teenage nighttime events together. They took my to my first dance club (pretty much snuck me in, because I was only 15 at the time (remember, even though we are in the same grade, I was a year younger than Angel)), which was pretty amazing. We went on several runs to various places that young boys and girls go to together, like Goblin Valley (not the real Goblin Valley, but the one on 9th south.), and to the top of the world, and ice blocking in Sugarhouse park (and yes, we did have girls with us at the time, it wasn’t just a group of guys).

It was during this period that I got introduced to techno music. And if you know me, then you know I love techno music.

We (Angel, Jose, and I) were going to pick up some girls, and we were listening to some music in the car. I was about 14 or 15 at the time, and I’m pretty sure the song that came on was Jump by The Movement. I loved it. I asked Jose what type of music that was, and he told me it was techno.

I’m not sure when it was, but it was probably the next day, I ran off to the music store, and grabbed any CD in the store that had the word ‘techno’ on the cover (which amounted to about 3 CDs, because at the time—1992 or so—techno was still very new, and unbeknownst to me, very underground).  I immediately became entranced by the music, and have loved it ever since. I would listen to it during school… in the car… at home… basically everywhere.

And that is where I’ll stop this installment of the story, and leave you with a blast from the past…

and if you’re wondering… my second love is techno. My tastes have been refined somewhat, for as I go back and listen to some of the stuff I bought back then—the stuff that got me so entranced with the genre—I sometimes wonder what I was thinking. Because even though I loved it at the time, and it therefore still has a place in my heart, it really wasn’t that good. But I still love techno.

On to part 2 →