Happy Anniversary!

Aaahh, Valentine’s Day.  How sweet you are.  I think it’s silly that so many people get mad that people talk about having a “Valentine” when they don’t.  Come on.  I thought we were old enough that we could be thrilled for others when they are happy!  Perhaps not.

This Valentine’s Day marked the third anniversary of me and my ex-girlfriend’s first real encounter together.  I guess that sounds weird unless you understand that she and I are absolutely best friends…even after dating and breaking up.  I hang out with her all the time (well, used to…now I do when both of our schedules allow it, which isn’t very often, sadly).

Three years ago on a cold Thursday night, she and I were walking out of a choir practice and just happened to be walking the same direction to our cars.  I got to talking to her and getting to know her a little better.  Valentine’s Day was about a week away, so of course it came up in the conversation, and we talked about how we didn’t have Valentines and didn’t have anything fun to do that night.  I really didn’t even know her very well, but I was like “Hey, you should totally be my Valentine.  We’ll do something cool…beat the system!”  She laughed and agreed.  It was a date!!

During the following days, our date ideas evolved into an adventure in which we would get a couple changes of clothing, take pictures together in a bunch of places in different outfits, and put them into an album, and convince people that they had all been completely unaware that we had been dating for a couple weeks.  Then, to top it all off, another friend of mine invited me to find a date to bring to a little dinner he was cooking for his Valentine that night.  Well, my Valentine just happened to be the girl that had somehow ended up being the annoyingly persistent third wheel or double-date buddy for like six of his previous dates.  When I told him I already had a date for that night I could bring, he was very surprised (which I found a little insulting).  I didn’t tell him it was the girl that seemed to pop up at every one of his dates though…the set-up was priceless.

When I picked her up on Valentine’s Day, I had decided to be sappy and had cut out about 30 paper hearts of all sizes, red, pink, and white, and attached them via string to the inside roof of my great big van…they were hanging everywhere.  It was adorable.  We headed to my friend’s house, and posed in a ridiculous and flirtatious pose as we waited for him to answer.  When the door opened, it was his Valentine, who busted up laughing and told my friend to come to the door.  He came, and when he saw my Valentine, she threw his hands in the air, yelled in agony and sarcastic coincidence and just walked away.  It was brilliant.  We had a quaint dinner (he is a really good cook) and then headed back to my house.

Inspired by Tanner and Linda

Picture time!!  We found some pictures of our friends who were couples and copied them exactly for our own album.  Looking at it all, it was convincing “evidence” that we had been dating for a couple of weeks.  It was brilliant.  But…it wasn’t enough.  We needed something more.  So we decided to put on aprons and take a barrage of pictures of us baking an ice cream cake together.  Only…what random college student knows how to make an ice cream cake?  Not us.  So for the pictures, we just took out a mixing bowl, filled it with flour, and plopped a couple ice cream scoops on top.  We didn’t actually take a picture with the bowl in it…we just needed quick access to flour and ice cream (do you even put flour in an ice cream cake?).  We threw it all over each other and got all messy and acted all cute as my mother took pictures of us with her fancy camera.

We needed something that would leave no question in anyone’s minds that we were dating…so we staged a series of photos so I could photoshop a picture of us kissing with flour all over our faces.  It turned out beautifully!  It looks 100% real.  I was quite proud of it.

Okay, I just lied.  I just know she will read this at some point, and I wanted her to get really mad at me.  ;)  Actually, it was a real picture.  I had never kissed anyone before, but the serious actor in me somehow had it in him to put this picture together.  You couldn’t really call it a kiss, though, because it basically went “1……..2………3……….GO!” Then we bashed heads together at lightning speed and hoped my mother caught it on camera.

We had to do it twice.

Then we posted it and went from being single to being in a relationship on facebook.  Baha.

And that was my first date with my would-soon-be first girlfriend.  And the first adventure of a stunning series of epic endeavors we would have together all the way through.

Happy Anniversary, Madison!