Twelve years ago tonight, I sat in a café having dinner with a dark-haired guy who had glasses and a kind face.  Our conversation was easy and fun and went on for hours, in spite of the fact that it was a school night for me and it was a half-hour drive back home for him.  Even after I finally put on my coat at about 10:30, we still sat at the table chatting for quite a while.  Neither one of us was in any hurry to end the evening.
Ten months later, we were engaged.
Not long ago, Matthew asked me, “Mommy, why did you marry Daddy?”  I found that a fascinating question, coming from a six-year-old.  And there are so many ways to answer the question.  He is kind.  He is smart.  He gets me.  I told him  my most deeply personal stories and they didn’t scare him away.  He is handsome.  He is open-minded towards those who see the world differently.  I knew he would be a good daddy.  All of those answers are true.
But maybe, it comes down to this: I married him because on February 8th, 2001, I sat with him at a small candlelit table in downtown Palo Alto and we talked for hours and nothing short of a nuclear blast could have pulled either one of us away from that table. Â We did not want the conversation to end. Â And, in a way, it never has.
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