How We Met

Since we are talking about our future plans and current locations I thought it only fitting to provide you with an almost ancient tale now of how I met my tall companion.

I remember the first time I met Lee. I was 7 years old. I was the geekiest, most awkward 7 year old in class which is summed up by the fact that I was coming home late from choir practice. I was terrified. I had met my mum’s new friend and her youngest son a few times over the last week but not her son who was almost the same age as me. Both our families had bonded over the fact that our fathers were living in Saudi Arabia. Our brothers were in the same class at school and the infant’s teacher had introduced our mums when she realised both families had so much in common.

Our mums hit it off instantly. In a tiny Welsh town like ours it’s very hard for a lot of people to relate to such a unique situation so they were each others rock from the moment they met. Our brothers, who are the same age, were thick as thieves. They clicked instantly and got up to as much mischief as they could create. We went through a 3 year period where they were both convinced they were vampires. They were/are strange boys and we love them for it.

My nerdy self with my mental brother in Saudi Arabia a few years later

This was the first time I was meeting the oldest son, only a year older than me. I had never spoken to him but we were apparently in the same school. These days a year age difference is tantamount to nothing (mainly due to us being so bloody old that years drift into each other). Back then it was as if there was 20 years between us. Year 4 students should never even attempt to speak to year 5 students! Even looking them in the eye seemed like a crime. (This is grade 4 and grade 5 to any Americans out there).

With all the geeky extracurricular activities I was doing such as choir, piano and gymnastics I had avoided this moment for a week but now as I came into my house I knew that on the other side of that door was this new person. My mum opened the living room door and greeted me warmly and ushered me into the living room to introduce me “and this is Tania”. I stared at my feet as this is the painfully shy 7 year old’s response to a situation you can’t handle and Lee’s mum greeted me warmly with a “Hiya love”.

I took a gulp of breath and looked up, ready to pretend to be as old and cool as my nerdy brain would allow and there he was, this boy in his Manchester United away jersey (that he lived in) looking as uncomfortable as I felt. “Wanna play football?” I said, desperately trying to think what nonchalant actually looked like.

“Yeah” he shrugged…and I was in love.

I realise at 7 people don’t call it love, people call it school yard crushes or fancies. But I knew like I know now that it really was love at first sight for me. Unfortunately, of course, it was not reciprocated when we were 7 but we became great friends and for a 8 year old boy to be friends with a girl at that age it was as close to love as you can get (or at least that’s what my Disney influenced mind wants to pretend).

Proof that I taught him his computer skills

We’d play football every day in the garden. Him in goal and me taking penalties, I’d teach him how and what a computer was, yes we are that old that a computer was a rarity, and we would argue and talk for hours while I would beat him at board games (that’s right Lee , I’ve put it on the internet, at one point in our lives I could beat you at board games). Our mums used to call us ‘the two old men’ because we would chat from the moment he came into my house until he left at 10pm.

Us with our brothers (Lee still in his jersey)

Those were fantastic days, two families with only each other. Lee’s mum couldn’t drive so my mum would pile us all in the car, being small enough that all four kids could sit in the back seat (again it was the early 90’s and this didn’t seem as strange or unsafe as it is now). We’d go to the cinema and watch Disney movies, go to the park and play for hours on the swings and go swimming until we resembled prunes.

Fast forward to many years later and Lee’s family meeting my sister for the first time.

It was a real childhood and I am very lucky to say I spent it with the man I now, twenty years later, travel the world with.

Year’s later things got more complicated when his family moved to Saudi Arabia but a few months after that, so did mine…but that’s a whole other story.

I guess the important thing to take away from this story is that for me love at first sight exists , at one point I could beat Lee at board games and that it was some of the best years of my life.