The story of my Hubby

July 2003

This is my husband and I on our wedding day. It's the picture that ran in the paper a few weeks later. It doesn't really tell much of a story, though, so I'll fill in the blanks.


The year was 1999. I had recently graduated from college and moved to Alabama. My reasons were two-fold: I was tired of cold weather and I wanted to go to vet school at Auburn. I moved in with some family and started working as an intensive care technician at a local human hospital where my aunt was a nurse.


I was a little lonely and decided to play in the orchestra in the church I was attending. I played percussion in high school and college, and they needed a percussionist. It was time to start putting together their annual Christmas program. It was a pretty big production, and we recruited musicians from other places. We actually had 2 drummers as well as the percussion section - one from church, and one from a local college. In my experience there was a difference between percussionists and drummers (often drummers could only drum and sometimes not even read music). Imagine my shock when this college drummer saw I was having trouble with a bell piece, asked if I needed help, and then played the heck out of the piece! Turns out he was a percussion major and played drums also. So he wound up playing drums and helping out with the percussion parts.


We made small talk for several weeks. He found out I was just 10 months older than him (having previously figured since I was wearing scrubs all the time I must be a nurse and much older than him), found out I was single, and found out I parked in the upper lot during performances and walked down to the church. The last night of performances was during a horrible rain storm. He had parked down next to the church since he had to load up his own personal percussion and drum equipment that night, so he offered to give me a ride to my car. He played a cd for me that he had been telling me about - Metallica, but playing with an orchestra. I had to admit it was pretty cool, and I didn't hate it. Finally, after about 15 minutes he asked if he could call me sometime and ask me out on a date. It wouldn't be for a few weeks, since he was about to start finals, but after that could we go out? I said yes.


December 18 was our first date. It lasted for 7 hours! We went out to dinner, and talked. We went out for coffee, and talked. He took me back to his college and played some music for me, and we talked. We finally drove back to my house, and talked in the car. He dropped me off at 2am. It was the best date I'd ever had! We had so much in common. He was the first guy I'd ever been out with who actually liked sports as much as I did! Even though he was a #24 fan and I was diehard #3, I could get over that.

Feb 2000

Over the next year we dated exclusively. He comforted me as I was rejected from vet school several times since I was considered an out of state applicant. We talked about marriage and children, sports and religion, politics and music. There was one problem - he was allergic to animals. A fact he neglected to share until we had been dating for 2 weeks and I was already enamored. 30 minutes in my apartment and his eyes were swollen. He said he'd never met a cat he liked, mostly because of his allergies.

Enter Allie the Wonder Cat. She climbed into his lap and loved him every chance she got. He couldn't help but fall for her. And so, he became a cat person. A cat person who was allergic to cats. But he was in love with someone who loved animals. Then, Allie started to get lonely since I was spending so much time with him, so we got her a kitten, who then went on to become a very large cat. So now I had 2 cats.

Two years after our first date, we were doing the Christmas program at that same church. After the last performance he took me into one of the empty Sunday School rooms and proposed! A few months later we found out I'd finally been accepted into vet school. We planned our wedding for the summer after my freshman year. Sam went to see an allergist and they found an allergy shot and medication plan that worked for him. Yeah! So the kitties got to stay, and we all could be one happy family! 


So, we got married and had a wonderful honeymoon in Hawaii.

Then we moved into a rental house just outside Auburn so I could finish vet school. He was bored, so decided to compliment his music degree with a masters in molecular biology (yeah, I know). We attended numerous Auburn football, basketball, and baseball games. We are both Alabama fans, but grew to love Auburn while we were there.

We continued to grow closer as husband and wife, despite the hectic schedules (not an easy task, and not without a bumpy ride). We spent time with his family in Alabama, and even got to visit with my family on occasion.

We added a dog

Guinness, Gracie, and Allie

And then another cat

Dori with her sisters

He took me to NASCAR races and even to a Duke basketball game - sheer joy!!! 

Eventually we graduated and moved back to Birmingham. We both got jobs. We lost Guinness unexpectedly. We mourned her loss and tried to go on with our lives. Eventually we got another dog.

Hank

 Finally, we decided it was time to expand our family with another human. It took a year of trying, but we eventually got pregnant and were expecting a little boy in March of 2009. Just after the first of the year we lost Gracie unexpectedly. It was sad, but with the new baby on the way we had little time to mourn. Fortunately, the other animals kept us busy enough.

Notice how most of the animal pictures show them on our bed. My highly allergic husband, thanks to the wonders of modern medicine, sleeps with the pets! He's come a long way from when we first started dating (thanks Allie)!

So, in February (yes, 3 weeks early) we added baby to the mix. And my hubbie became a daddy.

And quite an awesome daddy he is. And quite an awesome hubby too.