Sunday, September 9, 2012

The Story Of Us




Our story starts like many others... We met just before he deployed to Afghanistan the first time...It was Nov of 2006 I was 18, he 19.  I was living in New Jersey with my family, going to college and working full time at a gym called American Woman. I basically ran the whole Aquatics department and I loved it.  Josh was stationed across the country at Ft Lewis Washington, we met online :D. He got his orders to deploy and was on a plane so fast my head spun. He left on January 9th 2007... the tour was supposed to be 12 months, but it was extended to 15. We made the best of it though finding our own ways to keep our love alive...

Back then, skype wasn't an option for military couples so we had to make do with Yahoo video (not even video chat, Just video) He could see me, I could see him but we shouldn't hear each other... So we did things like this every once in a while:


I know it seems stupid but it was all we had... Somehow we made it though... and on April 23,2008 he finally came home and we started to plan our wedding.

Plans changed a lot due to his commitments to the army and my issues with school and work then everything changed... On Sept 3rd my grandfather went in for a surgery and never woke up... he passed on Sept 20th and for me, life was never the same. My grandpa was healthy, he was healthier then me for God's sake and if someone that healthy could just die then who's to say I couldn't just die to!? That was my though process and thats what lead to me making the craziest, best choice I ever made in my life.

On December 14th, 2008 I called Josh and asked what he was doing the next day, it was a Sunday night and he was half asleep by the time I called... His answer was simple "I dunno going to work I guess why?" and what I said back to him changed both our lives forever. "I don't wanna wait anymore I'm booking a ticket and flying there tomorrow. The flight I wanna take leaves Newark at 6pm and lands in SeaTac at 9:15pm I wanna be married to you and I want it to be yesterday!" Well! That sure woke him up :D He quickly agreed but then asked me very seriously if I had though this through fully (I still believe he thought I was having some sorta manic break haha) and if I had told my parents I was leaving (I hadn't haha) but he agreed we had waited long enough for our wedding and said he'd be at SeaTac at 9pm to pick me up.

I was too afraid to tell my parents thinking they would either try to stop me or talk me out of it so I left a note instead "Dear Mom and Dad: Going to Seattle. Marrying Josh. Please start my car (Taped car key to note) Call when I land! Talk soon! -Sher :D"

It made perfect sense at the time.

I then took a taxi to the train station, a train to Newark Airport and a plane all the way around the US from Newark, New Jersey to Seattle, Washington... I will never be able to describe the feeling I had as I walked from the gate to baggage claim where I knew he was waiting... I remember looking around and realizing I had never traveled alone before... One think I remember very clearly is the salmon that are on the ground in the SeaTac airport... they're gold plated salmon... I made a game out of stepping on them as I walked down the long hallway to the shuttle... the shuttle ride felt like it took a lifetime... Finally I was off it and at baggage claim after almost 9 hours of travel the thing I was waiting for was standing in front of me and I melted.

I knew in that moment I was without a doubt making the right decision.

I ran to him and jumped into his arms and held him for what felt like a lifetime... You know in the movies where it looks like everything around the people vanish and they can only see each other? Thats how it was. I had never felt joy like that in my life and knew in that moment I never wanted to live a day without that feeling...


We wanted to get married the next day but Mother Nature had other plans... Tacoma was hit with the worst snow storm in almost 100 years the day after I landed... It was nothing compared to NJ snow but it was enough for them to shut down the city!

We were finally married on December 29,2008 at the Pierce County Courthouse in Tacoma WA surrounded by our best friends it was perfect. We had a big huge wedding in Aug of 2009 but we celebrate of Dec anni and thats the one I tell people about it wasn't about dresses or food or flowers it was purely about love and thats why it will always be special to me.





I wrote this just a few days after our wedding:


I have everything I could ever want and more
I'm sitting in bed right now, with Josh laying asleep next to me and I know my life is complete.
I wake up each morning and thank god for this amazing life I have and giving me the man of my dreams
So very few girls can say with complete honesty that they married their hero but I can.
I look at Josh and I see all that is good and right in this world. I see my whole life in his eyes and I know  this is right.
During the wedding I couldn't see or hear anyone else.  After the service, Jo came up to me and said she was sorry that Katlyn was crying and I looked at her like she was nuts and said "What are you talking about? Noone said anything but me Josh and the judge..."
It breaks my heart to know he's leaving again so soon but I know this is job and I know that he's gonna come home to me...
I have everything and if I have to give up my husband for a year so he can protect our country then I will! And I'm gonna stand behind him 100% for all 365 days of this deployment just like I did for all 15 months of the last one.
I'm finally living my happily ever after



Life was perfect... Or was it? Although neither of us knew it at the time inside Josh was a ticking time bomb set to go off at any minute... We would find out about the bomb... but we would find out just a little too late... Thats another story for another post though


So there you have it the story of how we ended up married





The blogs I wanna work on next are the ones about the two deployments then Block Leave, the PCS and finally the horrific events of 2011 that will bring us up to date... I hope to have all this done by the end of the week so that this is totally up to date and I can start making normal entries rather then ones explaining the past


No comments:

Post a Comment