@WhatAwonderdulLife For me it was how well the conversation and banter flowed between us and how immediately easy and comfortable it felt being around him.
We met at his twin cousin’s 30th birthday party that coincided with the 2010 World Cup and they had the England v USA match up on a big screen in their garden. My bestie had asked me to go along with her as her sister was dating one of the twins at the time and is rubbish at introducing you or just wandering off, so she knew she’d end up left alone in the corner with no one to talk to otherwise. I nearly didn’t go as was hungover from an Ian Brown gig the night before and bizarrely, DH was originally scheduled to work that night but managed to get his shift changed last minute to attend.
After some flirty banter at half time where I schooled him with my superior football knowledge and left him in stunned silence, as well as other good conversations throughout the night, the party was winding down and I was struggling to get a taxi.
He promised he could sort me one out to be there within 30 mins, which he duly did and offered to wait with me on the corner outside for it to arrive. He then tripped and fell head first into a bush, that I had to pull him out of (he still maintains there was a lump/bump in the pavement that he didn’t see in the dark - there wasn’t!) and after having a bloody good laugh, we had our first kiss.
He invited me back to his flat on the promise of vodka (which BTW never materialised), and, very uncharacteristically for me, I ended up staying the night. We then spent the whole of the next day together and the strangest (and best) part was how immediately comfortable and easy it felt.
I lived 200 miles away at the time so although we’d swapped numbers and loosely talked about meeting up again the next time I was back home for the weekend, I fully expected that to be that. But surprisingly, we got into the habit of regularly texting and chatting and then started taking turns driving back and forth every weekend to see each other. This went on for over 8 months, until I was able to officially change my work location to one in the North West and we moved in together.
Bizarrely, it turns out we had loads of other connections between us that we’d never known:
- one of my best school friends worked with him and my MIL at the local Kwiksave that I went to often
- I knew his step sister and step brother from school (he attended another local high school)
- we were having nights out at the same bars, pubs, clubs etc in our town during the same time period but apparently never came across each other, even weirder as some of my friend group then included lads who were also close friends of his aforementioned step brother and DH would occasionally go out to town with them
- Dh’s Grandad had a much younger brother and during the 70s/80s his GDad’s bro was on the same football team as my Dad, they drank in the same pub and him and his wife are a part of my parent’s friendship group. I now see them at loads of DH’s extended family parties and apparently they had attended other events (weddings, christenings, big birthdays) in the past that my family had been at. DH has such a close family, and always invite cousins, second cousins etc etc to any dos so who knows if our paths had crossed at one of those events many years before!
It’s a bit sad this thread is now getting some backlash. I don’t think anyone posting on here is being smug or gloating but actually just taking a quick beat to reflect on the happiness their relationship brings them. It so easy to forge ahead just trying to get through life, with all the noises, demands, stresses etc and forget to take the time to see and appreciate the little things that really matter.