The Story of Us

“I don’t know what I should post next” was my answer to my husband when he asked what I was working on.  He smiled and replied “Why don’t you tell our story?”

Cue the Music:

Here's the story of a lovely lady
Who was bringing up three very lovely girls
All of them had hair of gold, like their mother
The youngest one in curls

Here's the story, of a man named Brady
Who was busy with three boys of his own
They were four men, living all together
Yet they were all alone

Till the one day when this lady met this fellow
And they knew that it was much more than a hunch
That this group would somehow form a family
That's the way we all became the Brady Bunch

The Brady Bunch, the Brady Bunch
That's the way we became the Brady Bunch

(I am sorry if you can’t get that tune out of your head now!)

Well, it wasn’t exactly like that but it was close. I was a single mother of 4, living in Watertown, South Dakota. I worked for MediMedia and was the Director of International sales for dental publications in Asia, Latin America, Europe and Russia.  I travelled internationally multiple times per year and worked from home when I was at home. It was a busy life, I liked my job but I missed my kids when I was on the road. But a girl has bills to pay so onto the next plane I boarded.

One day, my father called. It was a call that would simply change my life. There was no pre-amble. He was direct.

“I want you to join eHarmony.”

I am conversant in multiple languages as well as English. I searched through my fairly extensive vocabulary and came up with the most articulate response possible “Huh?”

“Your younger brother is trying to get a job doing statistics with eHarmony and we need some real life feedback.” he explained.  At my silence, he dumbed it down a bit for me and said slowly, as though speaking to a very young child

 “I.. want… you… to… join… eHarmony.” And then, as an afterthought he added “I will even pay for it”. 

Well that got a quicker response out of me.

“No. I don’t owe you any money and I don’t need a boyfriend!”

“Now Honey…”

“Dad.. I am a single parent of 4, I have a house, a mortgage, a car payment, a yard and a dog and a semi-psycho ex-husband… I don’t need or want a boyfriend!”

“Great!” he replied, I could hear the smile in his voice.  “Thank you! I can’t wait to hear all about it! I love you daughter.”

UGG!

A week later I found myself cautiously, casually, checking for any responses to my account on eHarmony.  For 3 weeks nothing happened and I wondered if perhaps all those things my ex-husband said about me could possibly be true?  No feedback, waste of time and money!  And then BOOM there was some interest! (Ha! See my ex-husband was wrong!) I reminded myself that I really wasn’t too interested…I mean after all, I was doing this to help my younger brother.  There was an attorney my age who had never been married, spent his free time snowmobiling and skiing. Coffee with him was like having coffee with my brother.  Then there was a teacher my age, divorced, no kids but loved kids (which was good because I had 4 and well.. his life was devoted to teaching them). He was two inches shorter than me and dinner with him was worse than having dinner with my brothers AND it resulted in food poisoning.  How much feedback was needed?

A month later I am in Shanghai, China at a convention. My father is also there on business. After a long day at the trade show, we have room service in my room. It’s sort of a family tradition and it has been repeated on many continents throughout my childhood. He asks me about “my research”.  We sit together and I pull up the website.

“Oh look! I have a ‘match’.” I rolled my eyes at the term. I see more brotherly encounters in my future.

I click on the messages section and there it is, direct from the other side of the world:

CRAIG, 45, TAPPEN, ND, FARMER, WOULD LIKE TO GET TO KNOW YOU.

 My father coughed and cleared his throat. He paused, his world class command of the English language seemed to have temporarily deserted him.  “Well,” he sighed “don’t click on that one! You will fall in love with him, he will marry you, move you to North Dakota, work you to death and we will never see you again.”

“Geez Dad!” I laugh at the obsurdity of his comment. 

Later that night, alone in my hotel room in Shanghai with the sounds of one of the most vibrant cities on the planet pulsating 20 floors below me. I reread the message. I hear my fathers voice over the muted city noises. With a manicured and polished finger I hover the cursor over the ACCEPT button.   With a single click my world was about to be turned upside down.

To this day I hold up my hand and tick off each reason my father cited. … the first 3 definitely came true:

I fell in love with him (a love like I never knew existed… nothing brotherly about him!)

We Married

We Moved to North Dakota

And, well, while there is a high probability of the 4th item, the jury is still out on the remaining two.

What about the Brady Bunch analogy? I brought 4 children and he brought 5. Every day is an adventure.