Our Love Story – Told by Him

Our Love Story – Told by Him

Note: I edited NOTHING from Stuart’s below written story. I feel like it’s important to mention it as I am still in awe of how he expressed himself in this piece. He never ceases to amaze me and for that, I love him…

I was the new kid in elementary school and I was disgustingly nervous about it. New school for grade 8, new kids, new teachers, new home… just a new world, and I didn’t want any of it.

The first time I ever saw Danielle, she was taking a drink of water at the fountain right outside my classroom door. I oddly couldn’t stop staring at her from my chair, but the person I am, I just chose to bottle my feelings.

One friday at lunch time I was preparing for a half day from school because of a hockey tournament, so I went to Pizza Pizza just down the street from our school. I saw Danielle and her friend Natasha walking together, as they had stopped in the convenience store to buy something. Natasha was outside and introduced herself, as did I. She then asked a question I wasn’t prepared for but was the start of my journey with the woman I love today.

“Who do you like new guy?”

I responded nervously and said:

“Her” as I pointed to a girl with a big smile, ponytail, cargo pants and a baseball t-shirt and vest. (I didn’t even know Danielle’s name at the time.)

And with a childish smile and giggle, Natasha said:

“Danielle!?! Oh really!?! Wow!!??”

Danielle walked out of the convenience store with a package of Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups and I locked eyes with the woman I will love for the rest of my life. Unfortunately, I was nervous as hell and couldn’t speak properly. I was giddy, giggling and acting childish because I had never done this before. A gruelling couple of minutes that felt like a lifetime, I sprouted some courage, which I knew I had saved for this moment and asked the magic words:

“Wanna go out with me?”

Danielle surprisingly said yes very quickly, which was odd to say the least, but who cared right… SHE SAID YES!!! I was ecstatic!!! Funny thing was many years down the road Danielle actually admitted that she had felt sorry for me and said yes to be nice and she was shy… but I knew from that first encounter I was gonna marry this very special individual that would be the strong, beautiful, caring, loving woman i am with today.

Dating when we were young was difficult because I didn’t know what the hell I was doing. Just think of Ross and Rachel from “Friends” but we were 14 yrs old, but I loved this girl so much it would make a normal human being sick. I used to go to church on Sundays just to get a glimpse of her because I missed her so much from school. (If you didn’t know, she was a gymnast and missed a lot of school). She always said she didn’t know what love was when we were so young, but I did and I know that I LOVED her forever and regardless wherever life took us I would always have her in my heart.

And that’s what happened. High school hit and because she had to go to a specific sports school, we drifted apart, very far apart and lost absolute contact with each other. The thing is though that even while we lost contact, I thought about her all the time and even talked about her to friends in high school.

Fast forward seven years later while I was working at IBM, a random message on my msn messenger popped up…

Natalie Goddard??? Can’t be the same girl???? Could it???

Yup it sure is!!!

Now this was 7 years later since had been in contact. We are different people at this point, well we should be right. I know I was, and I was also in the process of joining the Army because I wanted to make a difference in the world – The world was falling apart because of 9/11. But when we agreed to meet up after so many years I just wanted to tell her that I missed her and that even though so much time had passed, just seeing her made everything alright again. So Danielle, sorry Natalie (at the time she was going by her first name which is another story entirely), was a student at Waterloo University and we had made a spontaneous date for me to come and see her there. After we spoke that night, I felt like the first day I meet her at the convenience store. The drive up I was nervous but had a total grip of myself. Our lives changed forever when we met up. When I got out of my parents car that I borrowed for the drive up, we surprisingly hugged and naturally kissed each other like no time had passed. Even though we drifted very far apart something inside the both of us held on to something that kept some type of fire lit, and I never wanted that night to end.

When we eventually started dating again not long after… I thought things would just fall into place. Man we were both wrong. Life was a real struggle. Life was real. Being an adult was real. We weren’t in grade 8 anymore. There were many ups and many downs but we managed to always stick together and always try to pull through. Bless Danielle’s heart for sticking around the hardest time in my life during my Army days and being away from home for months at a time. That took a huge toll on us, but we managed.

Even though life was life and times were great and also hard, I knew I was going to marry Danielle when we were young, so there was no question as we got older. Danielle openly admits as a kid she never thought about it, but I knew.

So after Danielle casually planned a weekend away to Prince Edward County in August of 2017, I went behind her back and messaged the Airbnb host/Wedding Photographer who Danielle booked time to shoot something for her blog so that I could incorporate a surprise proposal for the woman of my dreams.

After a few shots with the photographer, I got down on one knee and asked my lover, my companion, my soul mate and my best friend to marry me.

She said yes “obviously” with open arms and crying uncontrollably. It was one of the best moments of my life.

The best day of my life so far was meeting Danielle outside of Lee’s Convenience when we were 13 yrs old. I still remember it like it was yesterday, and I’m excited to see where life takes us.

Love you babe with all my heart.