I now pronounce you...

It been 8 years since my wife and I got married. Today we celebrate our anniversary and our marriage has been great. We've hit our rough patches and at times we thought we should take a break but we continued to fight for each other and we're together. We laugh together, argue together, and most importantly we are dorks together. I think that's what keeps us going. No matter how mad we might get about something we are always able to laugh about it. On top of that we are straight up dorks like I previously stated. When a song comes on that we like we bust out our best, dorked out moves and jam. It doesn't matter where we're at either. We can be in the car, at the store, or just on a walk and we bust out our moves. It embarrasses our 7 year old but it's cool. I'm sure he digs it...deep down he digs it. My wife and I met like any normal couple. We met through a friend and our first meeting included an injured dog. Yep, you read that right. When Rebecca and our friend Leanne showed up I met them at the door. I was so nervous about meeting Rebecca that I had to wash my hair twice and do my hair a different way. Yeah, I was stupid but I wanted to look somewhat good. So there I was, so fresh and so clean, and the first thing Rebecca says is,

"There's a dog that was hit down the road and we're going to go check on it."

"Um...ok."

I remember walking off with them and Leanne introduced us. It wasn't the way I thought it was going to go and to be honest, I thought they were joking about the dog until I saw it in the middle of the road. As we walked towards it a car was coming and instead of moving out of the way the car purposely swerved into the dog and ran it over a second time. We yelled at them and as the car passed the teens inside just laughed and hollered. Had they stopped I'm sure we would have beat them and thrown them in a ditch before torching their car in an orange grove. The car continued on and we tried to help the dog out of the road. I called one of the officers I worked with and she called animal control to come pick it up. We spent the rest of the night talking and hanging out. At the end of the night Leanne had jokingly mentioned to give me a hug and kiss and I remember Rebecca saying,

"Uh...NO. I'll give him a hug though."

I was on cloud nine after that hug and I was hooked. I remember when we spoke on the phone before we met and saying that I was not looking for anything. Rebecca said the same but after I met her and talked to her, I realized that I was looking for someone. We have been together ever since. On this day 8 years ago we were married. I remember how nervous I was and my buela Jimenez kept telling me that she was happy for me and that everything would be fine. My mom was running late and she still had to get to the church to do Rebecca's hair. I kept getting phone calls and I'm sure my blood pressure was through the roof. When my mom finally arrived to drop my brother off there was about 30 or 40 minutes left before the wedding started. My brother was going to jump into the shower and I remember yelling at him to hurry up.

"Dude, you have five minutes to shower and then we have to leave!"

"Alright man, but I have to shave too!"

"You have five minutes to do everything bro!"

"Man, how am I going to do that?"

"You need to take a County wash bro...you know, wash what counts and get out!"

Thank the lord that he was able to pull it off in record time and we were off. The church was about 15 or so minutes away so we jumped into the car and hauled butt. We were headed out and halfway there I began to smell something burning. The world around me froze as I thought about my vehicle. At that moment I remembered that there was a crack in the radiator and that I needed to fill it with water every other day or it would overheat. I snapped back to reality when I nearly ran a traffic light and I began to panic even more.

"What the hell are you doing Rich!?"

"I'm not thinking right! I completely forgot about the radiator and now the car is going to overheat and we have no time to stop."

We kept going and I remembered that someone once told me that if I ran the heater that the car would cool down a little. I blasted the heater and it actually went down a little but it wasn't enough. I passed up cars and took the last two corners like a stunt driver while pulling into the church. I parked and when I got out of the car I opened up the back door to get my jacket and all kinds of stuff fell out. I didn't care, I left it and ran toward the door where my father was.

"Where the hell have you been?"

"I have five minutes to spare dad!"

"Alright well get your ass inside everyone is waiting!"

I walked in and Rebecca's aunt walked me to the other end of the church for a few pictures. I was soaking with sweat and relieved that I made it.

"Alright, now I need you to sit here and pose like you're out of it."

"Well that won't be too hard. I was panicking that I wasn't going to make it here."

She laughed and I took a few pictures. I went inside to wait and when it was time the nerves were gone. I turned to see her at the door and I was overwhelmed with emotion. My smile was stretched from ear to ear and Rebecca smiled back at me. After the ceremony we were announced as a married couple and the rest is history. My wife and I met like any couple...well maybe not like any couple but it's been an adventure from the beginning. We have two kids together and I can't wait to see what life has in store for us. There is nothing that can hold us back, bring on the adventure and happy anniversary Rebecca.