But ours is my favorite.
I am what they call a hopeless romantic.
I can blame Disney princesses, Nicholas Sparks, and my mom for introducing me to classics such as Love Story, An Affair to Remember, and The Way We Were.
Not to mention my obsession with Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice and Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet.
And when I say obsession - probably have read both about 30x ...
Really, there is no blame necessary, I love LOVE!
I lust over a storyline about two people who are not supposed to be together but they can not help it because their love is
too strong.
And they would do just about anything to be together...
{Ever read Outlander, pretty sure it was written for a girl like me.}
Now, Ben and I didn't have waring families, one of us wasn't terminally ill or one was wealthy and the other was lower class but we did meet by the rarest chance and at a time where neither of us were open to love.
After my freshman year of college at Xavier University, I was coming home for the summer and actually planning a study
abroad trip for six weeks! After hosting two French exchange students during high school and dreaming of the Eiffel Tower, the Louvre, and all the romance surrounding Paris, I had always wanted to go.
Turned out, to find my romance all I needed was to go about 28 miles South on US-23.
Well to help pay for the trip, my dad got me an internship with the Ohio Department of Public Safety for the first half of the
summer.
I really was not a fan of waking up at 7 AM everyday and working till 5 PM during my
summer break, but if I learned
anything during my first year of college, it was that adulthood is not what it was cracked up to be.
It was a normal internship.
They put me wherever I was needed that day, answered phones, scanning, filing, normal Pam Beesly tasks.
I think it was about my second week of work, when my boss' direct secretary was out for the day, so I was put at her desk. I remember she was coming back from a meeting or lunch or something and she stopped to talk to me for a little bit. You
know the to be polite questions, where I went to high school, my major in college, if I had a boyfriend...
The answer was no. I didn't really meet anyone my freshman year of college and I liked it that way. I had always been the
relationship girl {again, hopeless romantic}. I was excited to do the dating thing, especially with me going to Europe.
Helllllo Prince Harry {sigh, he was single then}
Well my boss had other plans, "I have a son about your age, coming home from college this week, I think you two would hit it off!"
"Oh, thank you but..."
And the next thing I knew she was taking a picture of me to send to her son.
First of all, I was thinking no way this woman has a son my age!
Julianne Lee is gorgeous! You know the Rachel Green type of pretty. Effortlessly.
And ridiculously nice you just wanted to be her friend.
{Spoiler Alert: Julianne is my daughters middle name for a REALLY big reason and Julie is not only my mother-in-law now, but I consider her to be a best friend.}
Second, her son replied, "yeah I guess she is mom cute."
Mom cute? What the hell was that?
I mean yeah I was wearing office attire, a sweater doesn't exactly scream come and get it.
Julie and I laughed about it and she gave him my name and such.
I thought nothing of it.
That weekend it was one of my girlfriends from high school birthday party, as I was getting ready, I got a Facebook friend
request and message from a Ben Lee.
Ben Lee?
I don't know a Ben Lee?
"Hey, I’m Ben, you work for my step-mom. What's up?"
So naturally, I stalked his Facebook page.
Hobbies : WOW and sleep
What is WOW?
Favorite music: Coheed and Cambria
Who is that?
And the only pictures he had was of another girl dying his hair black in what looked like a dorm bathroom. {Come to find out it was our really good friend now Caitlin!}
Or him getting snake bite piercings under his lip.
Yeah, this is a hard no.
But it was my bosses son? Can I say no? I’m only at this job for a few weeks then I leave the country, I guess it couldn't hurt to go out on a date.
We messaged back and forth all night and eventually set up a night to go out.
I remember what I was wearing on our first date.
Distressed jean shorts with a checkered black and white halter top, oh man the things you can get away with when you are 19.
I can clearly picture myself waiting with my mom in our kitchen for him to pick me up.
Ben came to the door, and like in any young romantic comedy, my dad answered. Ben introduced himself and everything, I guarantee my dad said some sort of joke.
Ben still owns the t-shirt and shorts he was wearing.
It was a tie dye Joker from Batman tee and ripped cargo camo shorts, still his favorite pair!
I won’t say it was love at first sight but I knew deep in my bones, something was different about him. I still feel it today.
Our first date was not a dinner and a movie. It was nowhere fancy. There was no romantic music playing or fireworks.
We went to putt-putt golf, {I still have our scorecards}
Then, Tim Hortons to get bagels, reminder it was about 10pm at this point, and back to my house to eat them.
Yup, I am a cheap first date...spread the word.
We both knew it was not going anywhere. He had a family vacation to Florida in a few weeks, then while he was away I left for six weeks for Europe, and in the fall he was going to Marine Corps Boot Camp and I was back to Cincinnati for my
sophomore year of college.
Neither one of us wanted a long distance relationship.
We would just have the summer fling of a lifetime.
I remember the moment I fell in love with Benjamin Lee. Now, I can't remember where we
were driving to that summer, but we were in his little white Ford Focus, he was singing along to his Ipod music like always, and
Ice Cream Paint Job by Durrough
came on the shuffle.
No, not at all a romantic song.
Ben had all these crazy moves to go along with the lyrics and he was singing and moving and I could not breath I was
laughing so hard.
Right then, I knew, if this man could always make me this happy by just singing to a rap song,
he was the one.
And the rest is history...
So as you now know, I am such a sucker for romance!
I would absolutely love if you would share how you met your true love below!
xoxo
I have actually wanted to write a book about our story for a while now, maybe it is only interesting to me because its my life but like many military couples, Ben and I have been apart more than we have been together. I feel like I have a story to share with younger women who struggle with relationships or feeling like they need a man present to feel loved because before Ben, I was a total stage 5 clinger.
Now, I am more confident in my relationship with my husband and in love with myself more than I have ever been and the two are very much one in the same.