My Favorite Summer Memory

I just recently started joining the craze of participating in blog contests, I do enjoy the weekly exposaroonie contests and I just participated in guessing Madeline's weight over at Matt, Liz and Madeline. Since they are quite fun I was excited to see that Steph from Those Corwins had just launched a contest on Monday morning. It's a different contest that I have done before because it is not about just leaving a comment, she wants a story about "your favorite summer memory"...so here it goes.



By far, my favorite summer was back in 2000. I just finished my freshman year of college and was looking forward to the freedom of no classes and reconnecting with my friends that had gone away for college. Right before finals started, the Honors Program at the University had a BBQ as a way to help us get nourishment for the hours of studying we had before us for finals. I had reluctantly gone to the bbq hung over, it was my friend Adam's birthday the night before and the massive amounts of peppermint schnapps had left me worse for wear.

At the bbq, a couple of the seniors were standing around being quizzed about what they were going to do with their lives and some where even being given the "we are going to miss you" speeches. I hadn't known any of them that well, I did know that one of the seniors I didn't particulary like for some reason I thought he was interested in my friend Alicia and since I secretly found him attractive I had to protect myself by thinking he was a jerk. So, Alicia and I were standing there as she was saying goodbye to this particular jerk, and he mentions that Alicia and him were planning to go see a movie because of some bet that Alicia lost, this is when I started tuning them out. GAG, I did not want to hear about their date. Then he says "you should join us". Wow, thanks I have always wanted to be present when my best friend and the guy I secretly have a crush on makes out in a movie- sign me up. So I politely declined, a couple of days later Alicia asks me to join her for the movie that her and this particular jerk were going to go see. I wasn't thrilled with the idea, but she promised that they were just friends and that they were going to see Cider House Rules, I am not sure what made me agree to going but I am sure it was just because I wanted to see this movie.

I decided to meet them there in case I needed to make a quick escape. I sat in the theater and Alicia sat in between me and the jerk so it wasn't too bad, didn't have to say a word to him the entire time. The movie was great and I was happy that I had decided to go, and even more excited to head home. Then they say they are going to a local coffee shop to grab something. Again, I am not sure what made me decide to go, but I am pretty sure it had something to do with the peanut butter chocolate frappe that they made so well. We sat at a table at the back, the jerk directly across from me and Alicia sitting on the other side of this three person table. Quickly, conversation started flowing between the jerk and me and I realized that he wasn't a jerk and that he was quite possibly more interested in me than Alicia. The two of us talked non-stop and made plans to go to lunch since we worked close to each other. The night ended and I was on cloud 9.

We went to lunch, dinners, more movies, had our first kiss, he took me to my first Giants game at the new ballpark, we spent countless hours together and while watching fireworks out his apartment balcony on 4th of July he told me he loved me. I was head over heels, my first boyfriend and quickly by the end of the summer I knew he was the one. Little did either of us know what we were getting into, by the end of the year he was living in San Francisco and I was in Reno going to school. We would long distance date for close to 5 years and when I made the move to San Francisco in May of 2005, he proposed on my birthday which also happens to be the first day of summer. Brett later told me that he thought I looked cute that day at the BBQ and that he was looking for a way to get me to the movies so we could get to know each other better. What a sly little devil- it was part of his plan all along.