Fun Facts for Valentine's Day

Hi there, it is me again.  Remember me?  My name is Dylan and I am Tracy’s husband.  You might remember me because I tend to hijack Tracy’ blog every once in a while.  Well I am at it again.  I have hacked her blog and Facebook account and wanted to post a blog that I just wrote.  I wanted to do this for our anniversary a few months ago but I kind of missed the boat.  Valentine’s Day was my next best option.  These are a few fun facts that people don’t know about when Tracy and I dated.  We dated for a little over 6 months.  I hope you enjoy:

-3 months after my mission, I was walking into church with 5 or 6 of my closest friends and I was about to assume our normal arrangement in the back row of the room.  All of the sudden, I noticed Tracy sitting by herself on the other side of the room.  It had been about 3 years since I had seen her, so without thinking, I kept walking toward her and totally ditched all of my friends.  I sat next to her and we started talking and catching up.  We talked throughout the whole meeting.  By talking, I actually mean that I was trying to ask her out as subtly as I could.  She wasn’t interested.  We kept talking and about half hour into the next meeting (an hour and a half of asking her out), I somehow convinced her to go on a date with me, but it had to be labeled ‘a friendly date’.  How lame is that?  She was weird from day one.  Anyway, she agreed to go out with me.

-Right after aforementioned semi-rejection, Matt Simmons came up to Tracy and gave her a hug and said that she needed to go on a date with him.  I felt better by the fact that she told him no too.  She wasn’t just trying to reject me, she was rejecting everyone. 

-I never actually called Tracy after I asked her out.  Three days after church, I received a random text on my work phone.  At the time, I didn’t have text messaging (can you actually believe that?! How did we survive without text messaging?!) so I couldn’t tell who the message was from.  The text read, “Hey, how is your week? Tracy”.  Had she not put her name in the text, I would have had no idea who it was from and I couldn’t reply.  LUCKILY, I was able to tell it was from Tracy and I called her right then and made plans for the ‘friendly date’.  So, I guess you could technically say that if Tracy had not put her name in that text, she never would have scored me (my confidence was pretty shaky after the semi-rejection at church so who knows if I would have had the pelotas to actually call her?)! Yeah right! I would have been the one losing out. 

-Our first ‘friendly date’ was a double with Jake Root and some other chick that I have forgotten about.  We went to see ‘Mr. and Mrs. Smith’.  A few minutes before the movie ended, Tracy leaned over and put her head on my shoulder.  It was one of those, “she-touched-my-leg” moments.  Of course I didn’t think much of it because my rejection wound was still pretty fresh. 

-We ended up hanging out a few days later at Chance Hobbs’ house where we swam.  I remember that I went to pick Tracy up and dunk her under water and she freaked out because she didn’t want to get her hair wet.  That was my first indication that this chick was high maintenance.  She continued to explain to me that ‘chlorine is so bad for her color-treated hair and that she would need to use a ton of product to fix it’.  Okay, Tracy.  Weirdo.  

This was the first picture that we took of ourselves. It was taken on our way to Hobbs' house.

                                                             

-We then hung out a few days later when I asked her to go bowling with all my friends and I.  Of course, she shows up with her tiny lap rat in a purse.  Indication number two that this girl is probably more than I can handle.  We had a good time, despite the fact that I had to hold Princess Grace Kelly every time it was Tracy’s turn to bowl. 

Meet Grace Kelly. RIP. Seriously. We miss her.

-A few days later, we went boating with a bunch of my friends.  Tracy and I were sitting at the front of the boat and she proceeded to tell me that she didn’t want to get married until she was at least 30 years old.  Not that I was thinking that I wanted to marry this girl the next day, but it was interesting to hear that.  Just wait, it gets better. 

We had a lot of good times while boating.  I have always been really mature.

-A few days later, a bunch of friends and I were swimming over at Mark Gardner’s house.  Seriously, my friends and I apparently swam a lot.  Anyways, at this point I was definitely getting the hots for this chick.  I was starting to look past all of the high maintenance issues I was learning about her.  Well, after a few hours of swimming, everyone else had left and Tracy and I were just talking in front of Mark’s house.  Hunger started to creep up and so we did what any two 21 year-olds would do…we hit up TB (Taco Bell, an acronym, get it?). So we both jumped on my motorcycle and headed down to TB.  This is where it gets interesting.  Somehow, anytime I wasn’t shifting gears with my left hand, I was holding her hand that was wrapped around my waist.  I kept asking myself, ‘are we holding hands here?’  So we continued down to TB and ate probably the most unhealthy meal in the world.  It was such a good time.  What in this world could be better than Taco Bell?!

I miss my bike.  I seriously think it made me cooler.

-After TB, we rode back up to Mark’s house where Tracy’s car was parked.  We sat out next to her car for a while just talking.  All of the sudden I slowly went in for a kiss.  Ballsy, I know.  Well, I didn’t have the courage to just go for it so I went in right to where our lips were about to touch and held it there.  It was a test.  If she slapped me or pushed me away, I was good because I didn’t actually ‘try’ to kiss her.  It turned out that she didn’t completely reject me (for the second time) and I went in for an actual kiss.  Yep, we kissed.  We proceeded to kiss for a long time (I won’t tell you how long, that is a secret that I will keep to just Tracy and I J).  Let’s just say that it was long enough for Grace Kelly to get a very quality nap in the front seat of Tracy’s car. 

-This is my personal favorite and I honestly don’t know if anyone in the world knows this next fact.  The next morning, after our first kiss, I received a phone call around 8:00 AM.   I still remember exactly where I was when my phone rang.  It was Tracy.  I was really excited to talk to her until she dropped this bomb on me…she requested that I not tell anyone that we kissed!!! OUCH!!! How was I supposed to interpret that?  She claimed that my friends had ‘big mouths and she wasn’t ready for them to find out’.  Shot to the heart!  I complied anyways.   I am not even sure when she gave me permission to start to tell people that we were dating, but I remember having to be sneaky about it. 

-Well, 4 days later I knew that I loved Tracy and that I wanted to marry her.  I just didn’t know exactly how to tell her that, since she didn’t want to get married for approximately another 9 years.  It was really hard telling her that I loved her but when I finally went for it, I said, “Tracy, I love you and I know that we are going to get married.”  That was not an easy thing to say after officially dating for 4 days!  Her response was, “I know.”  WTH?!  I know?!  I know?!  It was that easy for her?  I was sweating bullets and pitting out trying to get those words out my mouth and all she has to say is “I know”?  Whatev.  To this day she still tells me that she loved me before I loved her.  I tell her she just wasn’t bold enough to say it until I did (can’t blame the girl, I guess).

-We fell in love fast and wanted to get married like the next day but unfortunately my dad was in Iraq and I really wanted him to be at the wedding so we had to wait a few months.  I ended up proposing to Tracy a few months later.  I tried really hard to surprise her with the proposal.  Apparently I did, because when I dropped to my knee, she told me that ‘she almost threw up’.   WTH is wrong with this chick? I guess I will take that as a ‘good thing’.  She said yes despite the gag reflex that was sparked. 

Mesa Falls in Eastern Idaho.  This is the exact spot that Tracy almost threw up on me.

-Things were not always totally easy while we were dating.  One night we got into an argument and did not end on good terms when Tracy dropped me off at my mom’s house (where I was living, I was cool, I know).  I walked in my mom’s house and just started crying really hard. (I was a pretty emotional dude back then).  My mom climbed out of bed, it was around 12:30 AM mind you.  She saw that I was pretty upset and the first thing that comes out of her mouth was, “Dylan, is Tracy pregnant?”  HAHAHAHA That still makes me laugh to this day.  I will clear the air and let everyone know that she WAS NOT pregnant, and that we worked everything out.  Man, I am so glad we did. 

-While we were dating, Tracy told me that she hates two types of cars.  1). Blue cars.  2). Saturns.  It is pretty ironic now that we have had a blue Saturn for almost 4 years.  I think that she really lowered her standards for me. 

So let’s recap: Tracy told me no when I asked her out.  Our first official date was to Taco Bell.  Our courtship should have lasted ~9 years but actually it could have been as short as 4 days.  She asked me not to tell anyone about us kissing.  She almost threw up on me when I proposed.  And she did not get pregnant while we were dating.  Are some of you wondering about how lucky I was?  Believe me, I still do. 

Cascade Lake.  I had awesome hair.  I want you to notice something: Tracy looks the same that she does to this day.  Me on the other hand...Tracy has controlled my hair styles. 

See. Check out the hair...

This picture is perfect.  I took this of us while driving on the freeway at ~80 mph.  She didn't have any idea that I was about to lick her face.  I don't think she would have been smiling if she had known.  I am awesome.