I know this is NOT politicial but I feel my lovely wife deserves some attention today, after all she has put up with all of my BS since we met in Nov 2000 in a "chat room" of all places. We met for coffee at a local "waffle king" and we became friends, we were both married to other people just not living with them (my ex had moved to Texas with her girl friend and I stayed married to her just so I couldn't screw up an get married again) and Dori was seperated from her husband he was a meth head and was a frequent flyer, she stayed married to him for tax purposes and the fact it kept her from remarrying.
So as you can tell it was not a love at first sight jump into bed and married the next day. We spent a lot of time in the chat room flirting, and would meet for coffee and the group would have monthly dinners, where things were wild for the time.
By May 2001 she had moved in with me while keeping her own apartment just to have a safety outlet just in case. By this time I had left the post office and we were both working in an old era system many of you probably called an AOL call center that was under contract to a company called SITEL before they sold out and ran the call centers to Mumbai, due to the cheaper labor, then tried turning all of the AOL account reps into telemarketing rofl that did not work out so well Dori walked out of the class about 30 seconds ahead of me and the other 28 reps followed me out of the door, we all went to HR and quit en masse.
We learned the HR manager resigned the next morning talk about things going to hell in a hand basket. This was in May 2002, in June 2002 Dori's father died, in that week end I swelled up like a balloon, water retention caused by congestive heart failure. I had to buy new pants and shoes just for the funeral and then went to the VA for help, they put me on meds and scheduled a bunch of heart tests, and then as they say the rest is history, in October 2002 I was told my heart ejection fraction was less than 30% 2 of my bypasses had closed off and were inoperable and I would never be able to return to work and I needed to file for SSD and due to the severity of my disease it would be automatic, I was like sure I have heard that before everyone I knew spent 2-3 years of fighting with SSA over disability benefits.
Shocks of all shocks, based on the VA tests and heart cath the SSD was approved and allthe paperwork would be completed before April 1st. The major problem we had was we were both still married to the other people.
We went to a lawyer and spent the last of our savings on getting our divorces so we could get married before the SSD was approved. In Georgia you have to file a weekly notice for a month when you can't find a former spouse which I had to do, I had no idea where my ex and her girlfriend were in Texas, Dori was easier to handle we just needed the ex served in a GA state prison, we knew where he was.
The divorces were finalized on March 22 2003, but at this point we were totally broke I had not worked since the previous May and Dori worked as a seamstress but all my medical appointments kept her from working a lot, so financially things were tough, we got the landlord to let the rent ride until the SSD was sent in a few weeks, it is amazing how few landlords will let you do that, but the place we were renting at the time was owned by a fellow veteran and his wife and they had a soft spot for disabled vets.
But we were able to get the marriage license in South Carolina but you had to wait 48 hours before you could pick up the license to make sure no one is getting married drunk or high I guess I figure the waiting period is to ensure a sober reflection before the leap into marriage.
Hell this was my fifth marriage and Doris 4th, it wasn't like we had anything against marriage we both believed in it, we had just made so many bad choices before. I took all of my old wedding rings to a pawn shop and we traded them in for 2 "new rings" hell they were new to us, but the 4 older ones were heavy enough that we got 2 decent rings (bands) but then came the next problem where could we get married the "chapels" all wanted a minimum of 100 or more, and they stopped allowing the Judges to marry people after court hours, but in SC all you need is a notary of the public.
Dori got on the chat room and asked if anyone knew a notary in SC that could help us out by doing it for free remember this was a week before I would see my SSD check with the retro payments based on a stop work date of June 2002, so I knew I was getting at least 4 or 5 months of money and they told us the SSD would be at least 1500 a month, so things were going to get better real soon just not that week.
Dori, had a friend call her and said she had talked to a friend of thiers and he would do simple service in a chapel and sign and notarize the document to make us "legal" for the government, she gave Dori the address on the Aiken Augusta Highway she didn't tell us what the business was free marriage place
The business was brand new had only been open for a week, there were lot's of flowers everywhere and the man was real nice he did an actual marriage service his wife and mom were the witnesses we did the ring exchange and left shaking our heads, what a place to start a future. But what the hell we all have to go thru one on our way out of the world. None of us are getting out alive.
We have had an excellent marriage despite the strange start met in an aol chat room and got married in a funeral home and seven years later I am still a very happy man. I hope I live to see many more anniversaries before I have to use that business again, but yes he has a client for when I need his real services, I think I owe him that courtesy for the kindness he showed Dori and I seven years ago.
It's not where you get married that counts, it counts as long as you love the person that is there with you.