What? Another Internet romance story? Yeh, but I hope you'll read it all and enjoy how it unfolds.

     Bill and I met on a newsgroup called alt.support.loneliness in October 1994. I had discovered this newsgroup when I got an Internet connection at my job at Ohio State University. It wasn't until I moved to Memphis, Tennessee that Bill and I first knew about each other. He was in London, Ontario, Canada. I had just moved to Tennessee from Columbus, Ohio to be nearer a long-distance relationship. But that relationship was fastly souring. Bill offered me a supportive shoulder to cry on while I came to grips with the fact that I had made a mistake. Three of my five kids were with me--my youngest son Kip (15), my second son Lee (24), and my only daughter Amy (18). My oldest son, Grant (25), lived in Atlanta, Georgia and my third son, Dan (22), lived in Clearwater, Florida with his girlfriend (now wife), Jeania.

     Deep down I knew that this Memphis kid was not the one to stake the rest of my life on. I was lonely for love and pinned my hopes on the first someone who showed an interest in me. This gave me the catalyst I needed to get out of my rut in Ohio and move out to another city like I had always dreamed about doing. On my own initiative, I wouldn't have had the courage to move out of my safe cocoon. I had endured a 23 year marriage to an alcoholic. Now four years after getting divorced, it was not surprising that my first venture into the world of dating again went way overboard. So, I moved to Memphis looking to be loved yet knowing that it wouldn't last. After three months, and many unfulfilled promises from this unfledged and spoiled adult boy, I couldn't take any more.

     Bill was always there via e-mail, always offering an open ear, always replying to my long notes with care and detail. He said he would stay up late just to answer my notes. I thought I was boring him to death with my long, redundant miseries but every time he answered my missives it would be with a refreshing sense of humor and an amazing perspective. He told me later that my letters fascinated him, they were so full and interesting. Over a short period of time, I felt he really cared about me. Already I loved him as a good, trusted friend.

     So, I made the decision to move to Florida where Dan and Jeania offered to let us stay with them in their one-bedroom apartment. That was a sight. The four of us camping out in their living room with our three cats, one of which had had five kittens four hours after we had gotten there. Dan had to keep his three cats penned up in their bedroom. There was one thing that I had to have set up. My computer. The rest was put in storage. Bill and I were able to continue to write. Within two weeks, I was able to find a house to rent, then a month later a job with a temporary agency as a 4-1-1 operator.

     Over the next several months, I wrote to Bill and told him my worries about being able to get a well-paying job but how I loved being in Florida. I had known in my heart that being near water was a great release for me, and being in Florida proved that fact. Also, being prone to Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD), that winter in sunny Florida I was free of the usual depressing and morose symptoms of this disorder. I loved being able to have the doors and windows open all the time. There was only one day that the temperature got down to 31 degrees F at night. The rest of the time was sunlight and warm breezes, well, except for one or two thunderstorms. Our house was 2 miles from the gulf coast and my kids and I made frequent trips to the beach. I kept thinking how dreams do come true.

     Back on e-mail, Bill told me of his dwindling relationship with a woman he had been seeing in London over the last two years. He had had to move to Toronto due to a job change a month before I moved to Florida. That meant a two hour driving time between London and Toronto and it was putting a damper on their relationship. I learned that he had been married for 25 years and was now divorced. I told him about my failed marriage.

     In between, we both thought about how each other seemed like the kind of person that we had been looking for. But neither of us said a word for some reason. I didn't suggest anything because I was self-conscious about my size. I figured that he just wasn't interested in a fat lady. His letters were always funny and supportive. Mostly, what tugged at my heart strings was his meticulous responses to my every word. He displayed an insight, perception, and understanding of me that I hadn't felt from any other man in my life. I felt that he could read my soul.

     After four months of living in Florida and still using the computer to try to find someone to date, I wrote Bill a particularly annoyed letter. I was fed up getting nothing but responses from married men. All of these married men told me the same thing. They weren't getting enough sex at home, or that they were just plain getting no sex from their wives. They didn't want to work on getting the marriage straightened out, they just wanted a quick solution to the no sex problem by preying on fat woman whom they thought were desperate for love and would do anything or go with anyone. The more I came across these pitiful men, the more it sickened me. Plus, I mentioned that I was getting more and more worried about finding a well-paying job to be able to make ends meet.

     Bill wrote back in his usual way but he put in one little innocent statement that opened up the floodgates to deepen our relationship. He said, "Wouldn't it be nice if you could move up here? That would solve both our loneliness problems and I could share my finances with you." As soon as I read that I was floored. Then an excitement set in. Was he meaning what I thought he meant? My mind started flying with possibilities. He must have been thinking the same thing about me that I had been thinking for several months about him. The part about helping with my finances I just pushed aside. I wouldn't see of him doing that.

     He is a very generous man as I came to find out. He was always inclined to give money to people who needed it, even if his account was low. He had offered me $1,000 when I first moved to Florida to help pay my bills while I was looking for a job. I naturally refused the offer. I just couldn't take money from someone I barely knew like that. I thought it was a bit odd at the time but was touched by his offer. Throughout more of our correspondence he explained that he had this tendency to help bail people out as he could. He has since helped me learn not to be afraid to give when others need it. Somehow the money is always there for us as we need it.

     Our correspondence quickly accelerated as we explored what was going on between the lines of our previous e-mails. Within a week, we decided that we had to meet. He would send money for me to fly to Toronto. Being allergic to cats, it was impossible for him to stay at my house so we decided it would be easier for me to come up there. The week before I was to fly up, we hurriedly made short videotapes of each other and sent them in the mail so we would have some idea of who to look for at the airport.

     I was very apprehensive about what he would think of me since I am a big. In e-mail I had told him that I was big. He said that didn't matter, but I had already had the experience of meeting face-to-face with men and seeing the rejection in their eyes. I knew that even though the man had the best of intentions that the actual laying-on-of-eyes could be traumatic. We both said that if we weren't attracted to each other when we met in person that we would look at this weekend as just two old friends who wanted to get together.

     I had a feeling that it would go deeper than that but my cautious nature said to me, "Make the plans, but don't plan the results." I knew that if he was turned off as a prospective lover after this weekend that it would be hard for me to handle the disappointment. But I felt brave and like a woman of the nineties that could handle anything if it was done all in good taste, with honesty and finesse. If he didn't want to fall in love with me then I could go back to my resolve to live my life on my own. My kids would be fine companions when I wanted company. Deep down I hungered for body contact and to have a man look at me with desire. In reality, I didn't expect to get it. So, I cautioned him not to jump in too deep too fast, not until he had seen me in person.

     I liked what I saw of him when I got the video. He didn't look at all like he sounded--like some meek, puttering around old professor. He wasn't even a professor but he had been an assistant professor for one year once. What I saw was a fairly skinny guy who had dark hair with graying at the sides and a handsome yet not handsome face with a pointy nose. He looked surprisingly boyish for his 54 years. He took me around his apartment via his camera and explained everything in front of the lenses. Then he sat on the couch and hugged a huge teddy bear while he told me about his job history and how he had moved around fairly frequently. He came to the conclusion that he evidently couldn't hold a job longer than two years, except for the time in Thunder Bay.

     His humor infected me with great warmth for him. After he got my video and viewed it, he wrote to me and said that what he saw of me made it difficult to judge my size, but that wasn't what he was focused on. The audio part of the tape hadn't recorded properly so the sequence where I sat in front of the camera and talked to him was muffled. But he said he liked my coy charm and how animated I was when I talked. He was amused when I got out a red bandana and played with it, then put it on. I was amazed that he still wasn't put off about meeting me. But, like he said, since we had become good friends through our e-mail, he already loved me. I could barely wait until departure day a week later.

     Easter weekend 1994, I flew to Toronto. I hadn't been in an airplane since 1966, and that plane hadn't even been a jet. My desire to meet him helped to overcome my sudden fear of flying. I felt like I was on a great adventure after I got used to the movements of the plane. My thoughts were continually on what would happen at the airport when we finally met. Would we automatically embrace? Would we be tongue-tied and awkward? Would I see that look in his eyes right away that he was sorry I came? When our eyes found each other at the airport, it was like meeting an old friend except we weren't used to what each other looked like.

     He stood up as soon as he saw me and called out my name. Trying to take each other in all at once was a heady experience. I became suddenly shy. I couldn't bring myself to reach out and embrace him, and he couldn't either. He offered to carry my heavy bag and I wouldn't let him. There was something in my mind about being a liberated woman. In the parking garage, we wandered around a bit while he tried to remember where he parked his van. He didn't say anything at first, and then when he finally admitted it to me that he was lost, I grinned. For some reason when he did that, I knew that I loved him. I'm not sure why but I do remember feeling that. He was unassuming yet trying to be nonchalant. When he admitted with a shy smile that he couldn't remember where he parked his car, I grinned and my heart warmed. I went over to the railing and looked out on the new-to-me city and let him figure out where the van was. Pretty soon, a blue Dodge Caravan pulled up and I recognized him sitting in it. His humor pulled him through as he said to me, "I'm a man, I couldn't admit that I couldn't find it."

     Later at the apartment, he nervously led me around the whole place. He hadn't hugged me yet and I was going to follow him around till he did, or until I got up the nerve to give him one. Why is it that the bedroom is always the last room to be shown? I don't know but it always seems to be. It was finally in the bedroom, after he showed me the closet, that he turned around, spread his arms out, and gave me a hug. And then a short kiss. He told me he had been nervous about when to give me a hug. Even after he had shown me the complete layout and given me the hug, I still followed him everywhere he was going. Later on he told me that that was what captured his heart, how I kept following him around.

     Being 11:00 at night, it was too late for much else except getting ready for sleeping. I felt in bad need for a shower so he got me a towel and I slipped into the refreshing spray grateful for a few moments alone to think. I surmised that all was going well so far. The ride to his apartment was in the dark so it was hard to get much of a sense of the city. We talked a bit and I was aware of my self-consciousness. I was used to being around my kids all the time and the easy way we have with each other. I was more aware of my large self and wondering what he really was thinking of me.

     After I showered and felt more relaxed, I hesitated about what to put on. It seemed silly to put on street clothes again so I matter-of-factly put on my long, flowery nightgown, not a silky, sexy one--I didn't have one anyway. I said to myself, "Clothes are clothes. This nightgown could just as easily be a housedress. Why put on regular clothes when it is so close to bedtime?" I didn't own a robe so I went back into the living room sporting my nightgown. He didn't seem too surprised and I think he said something about why not be comfortable.

     I sat down on the couch fairly close to him but not right beside him. We sat and talked some more and little by little he inched over. I finally asked him if he would sit beside me close so we could hug. He liked that idea. It wasn't long before we were kissing. I have to admit that because of my traditional way of thinking I feared he would think I was "fast" if we dove right into things. But I kept thinking also that "this is the nineties not the sixties", why have pretenses, we're too old and wise to hold onto such teenage images. So we meet, so we fuck and maybe never meet again. But at least we could say that we were honest about ourselves and what we wanted to experience.

     The evening unfolded into a special memory that is meant just for Bill and me to share. And along with that unfolding, a love blossomed between us. With each step, a growing certainty wove around us. We talked and loved and sensed and felt that each other had the capacity to fulfill the empty spots we both had. We sat up the whole night getting to know each other, falling asleep towards morning only because our bodies demanded it.

     Before I left, Bill had uttered something about prenuptial commitments and that he'd wait for me to decide if I wanted him. Yes, I wanted him but the whole scope of the thing was overwhelming. It would mean another long distance move, another bout of dislodging my kids, another change into the unknown. And, yes, I would be taking a chance again. A chance on someone I really didn't know a lot about. How could I trust my intuition after the fiasco in Tennessee? This was the hesitation that Bill felt in me. It wasn't about not wanting him, it was about me.

     I flew home late Sunday night lacking sleep but knowing in my heart that I wanted to marry him. He wanted me. He had no doubts. His unwavering decision that he wanted to be with me gave me the stability and security to trust and love him. I felt that I knew him well from all the supportive e-mails he had written to me for seven months. The keen friendship he had extended to me was open and honest. Our relationship started on a friendship not on a girlfriend/boyfriend note. We didn't write in the spirit of trying to impress one another. We wrote with empathy and a genuine concern in supporting each other.

     The next day back in Florida, I woke up more sure about wanting this good man. I wrote him a note saying "If you want me, you can have me." He wrote back and said, "Hmmm, this sounds like a marriage proposal, so let me make it official. Will you marry me?" We still laugh about who really did propose first. I didn't say an official yes until a few days later, after I had written that I wanted to hear the words from his own mouth. And even though I knew I wanted to marry him, I still had to let it sink in for a few days.

     I did hesitate but the hesitation was only because I was wary of leaving town again for another Internet romance. I had already put my kids through this once and we were travel weary. The bad vibes from the previous experience made me hesitate.

     But, honestly, the main reason I hesitated was because I didn't want to leave Florida. I was in a different realm there and experiencing an emotional lift like I hadn't ever had before. It was like I had shed my former self. Plus, I wasn't experiencing the symptoms of SAD. Being free of those symptoms was the biggest reason I was hesitating. While living in Ohio, January through early April were a struggle to cope with because of the feelings of low self-worth, lack of energy, and pathetic depression I went through because of the lessened daylight. Canada being even further north made me fear that the SAD would be even worse and last longer.

     Bill felt my hesitation, and I explained it to him. At first he thought I was questioning him and his character. His reassurances that he was a "good guy" may seem trite to others but it reaffirmed to me that he was. He had a confidence about himself that drew me to him. It wasn't an arrogant confidence, just a sure and firm one. After being married to such a flake the first time around, this trait appealed to me. Bill's faith in himself has been a steadying influence for me yet. Amidst the warmth and beauty of Florida, I had healed my wounded heart enough to take a chance on Bill.

     Next all the questions about when, how and where to get married came at us. What do people from different countries do when they want to have a life together? What should have been very simple suddenly got complicated. He went to an immigration lawyer since we weren't sure. The lawyer advised us to get married as soon as possible, in Canada or in the States, and then move to Canada to start the immigration application process. The main reason for the rush was that since my daughter would be turning 19 in July, it would benefit us to start the immigration process before her birthday since the cost would then go from $100 to $900. She wouldn't be considered a dependent anymore, and would have to immigrate as an adult.

     The whole idea of moving to Canada was unreal to me but exciting. Whenever I told anyone in Florida that I was getting married they were happy for me, but then when I mentioned that I was moving to Canada, there was great expression in their eyes and usually an "Oh?". Like it was just as hard for them to comprehend.

     My son, Dan, was sad that we were moving away, but his girlfriend was even sadder. They kept jokng that this guy better hadn't turn out to be some serial axe murderer. My kids and I joked about this with Bill, too. But, you know, in the back of your mind you always entertain the possibility that this could be true. Yes, I took a risk but I trust my intuition. Our six months of correspondence as friends helped in that respect immensely. It really was better if the relationship started out as a friendship. Truthfully, I was just thinking about leaving my pink grapefruit and tangerine trees more than anything.

     One month after meeting Bill in person, he flew to Florida for us to get married. I had only one week's notice to get the wedding preparations together, and to start packing up my house before he arrived. In a flurry of phone calls, I arranged for a justice of the peace, hotel accommodations for Bill--since he's allergic to cats and couldn't stay with me and my houseful of two adult cats and five kittens, found people to adopt the cats, called around for a rental truck, ordered a wedding cake, and told the Salvation Army that we would be leaving them lots of stuff on the back patio for them to pick up the following week. Trips had to be made to a clothes store to choose a new dress, the grocery stores to snatch up any empty boxes for the packing, a florist shop to choose a small corsage of flowers for my intended hubby and myself, and to my beloved beach at my daughter's thoughtful suggestion for daily refreshing dips in the bouyant surf--each visit being very poignant knowing I wouldn't have access to this luxury soon. In between, my kids and I sorted, packed, and dumped household possessions. Bill wrote me poems from Toronto that sustained me through it all.

     Everything was going smoothly along despite the rush. We decided that we wouldn't have enough time pick out wedding rings. This bothered me since this symbol of being married was important to me. The one friend I had found in Florida made jewelry as a sideline business. She wanted to make us wedding rings out of gold wire to use until we could have the time to look for rings properly. After Bill arrived, we took the time to go over to her house and have them made. She said it was a gift but Bill insisted on paying her for the cost of the wire.

     Bill arrived on a Friday and as soon as I picked him up at the airport we drove to the marriage license bureau. I was very conscious of him being at my side the whole time. It felt strange but wonderful. The license cost $80. The woman who filled in the forms had a great time learning about how we had found each other. Next stop was the hotel, figuring that we needed some time to get reacquainted, and that we both needed some time to rest before he met my crazy kids. As we stood in the hotel room and looked at each other, we couldn't believe our fortune in finding each other, in finding another person in the world who wanted to love each other like we did after having such lonely first marriages. We both knew that this was the truly right step to take.

     Finally, after an hour's respite at the hotel, we went to my house. Bill and the two youngest kids that were going to be living with us had been corresponding by e-mail after they learned of our upcoming marriage. My daughter had a delightfuly wicked time introducing Bill to our dysfunctional way of life. She wanted to give him a chance to really get to know us before the wedding. That way if he had any second thoughts about what he was getting into, this would be his opportunity to back out. It is one thing to tell a person what you are like; it is another for them to discover it by themselves. It's very hard to actually understand what is meant by "I have moods" or "I snore very loudly" or "I don't do housework well", which are the things that I had already warned Bill about myself. Amy added a few of her own. Bill was undaunted by it all. I had to admire him even more for that.

     Dan and Jeania were at my house by the time I arrived with Bill. We were taking everyone out to the Red Lobster restaurant. They all sized him up and decided that they would let me get married to him, as long as we did go out to dinner. He took their teasing very well. Bill spent most of the time on the back porch admiring the sand in the grass and the huge cactus plants growing in the back yard because the cat dander made him wheeze. I wondered how he would manage the next day when he would be at the house all day packing the truck.

     Dinner turned out to be a most memorable event. At one point, I turned to Bill and asked, "So, Bill how is everything going? We haven't embarrassed you too much yet, have we? We could have done something pretty eye-catching like putting spoons on our noses." Whereupon, Jeania says, "You mean like this?" and puts a spoon on her nose. Dan and Kip immediately joined in. Bill hid his surprise quite well but admitted to me later that he had felt embarrassed. I learned that Canadians are generally more conservative than us Americans, and our louder and boisterous behavior was a bit much for him to get used to. Unfortunately, for him, that wasn't the last time we embarrassed him at a restaurant. We did tame down some over the next year and we also got Bill to loosen up.

     The wedding the next day was going as planned up until the time came for us to be going out on the beach for the ceremony. All of my kids, except for Grant who couldn't come down from Atlanta, was in the hotel room with us. Amy was doing last minute fussing with my hair. The rest of the crowd was sitting around having a good time while waiting for the main event to begin. Someone had blown up some balloons and they were being tossed around the room.

     I had planned on having the ceremony on the beach at sunset. As sunset started clanging down on the horizon, I started to panic. The justice of the peace wasn't anywhere in sight, or in touch by phone. I frantically called and called her number but only got an answering machine. Sunset turned to darkness and I couldn't hold back the tears. Everyone in the hotel room was watching me fall to pieces not knowing what to do or say. Bill kept coming over to me and touching me. His face was blank because he didn't know what to do any more than the others did. All I remember is that he kept saying I looked beautiful. To this day, I still don't know what happened to that justice of the peace. She didn't answer my calls the next day, either.

     It was May 12th and I wasn't going to get married on the 13th, no matter what. I'm not superstitious. No, not me. But I wasn't going to have the 13th for an anniversary date. We had a houseful of stuff to pack and a long drive to Canada ahead of us. We didn't have time to arrange another wedding party. We had to get married before we left Florida, and before that night was over. Of that I was sure of. Desperately, I turned to the phone book and started calling the list of JP's in the yellow pages. After two or three numbers turned out to be answering machines again, the next one that I tried was a live voice. My frustration had turned to tears again as told this man the story of a wedding waiting to happen. He patted my head through the phone, told me his name was Kash, and that he'd be there in 45 minutes. I hung up feeling more hopeful but still cynical that this one might not show up either.

     My 2nd oldest son, Lee, in the meantime had gone down to the hotel bar to have a drink since all I had was champagne and was waiting to open the bottles till after we were married. He kept asking around the bar if there was a JP anywhere and he did turn up one lady who was. He called the room excitedly to tell me the news, but by then I had gotten Kash to come. I went down to thank the woman and was glad I hadn't agreed to go ahead with her. She was soused. But it was sweet of my son to try.

     We were all starving. The plan was to order pizza for everyone after we were married. Since we had to wait for the JP to arrive, I decided we might as well eat while we were waiting. As luck would have it, the pizza and the JP arrived at the same time. Kash parallel parked in front of the hotel and nearly took a fender off the car behind him. The really funny part is that after he had my intended husband get a wheelchair out of the back of the car, Kash told us that he ran a driving school. Seeing Kash ensconced in a wheelchair made my hopes of being married on the beach nonexistent. He asked where we were going to be married. I said that I guess it would be by the pool since we wouldn't be able to get out to the beach with his wheelchair. I reassured him that that was okay. I was just ecstatic that we had a JP in hand.

     Kash said, "Well, that's no problem as long as these strong guys here can help get me out there. I've married people in swimming pools, in ocean, on bicycles, and on boats. Here, take a look at these." And he fished out some newspaper clippings from his portfolio as proof of his wedding adaptability. I had tears of gratefulness in my eyes.

     First, we stopped at poolside where the pizza had been dispatched. Kash readily accepted a few pieces of pizza. We ate quickly before the day turned into May 13th. My youngest son and Bill started the trek out to a beach hut that was 40 yards away from the pool patio. They pulled Kash backwards in his wheelchair so it would roll more smoothly. Everyone else followed--Dan and Jeania; me and my daughter, Amy; and Lee, lastly. It wasn't surfside but it was in the sand. The bamboo beach hut was darkened but Kash found enough light coming from the parking lot lights to be able to read the wedding service he had prepared. My shoes came off next. I hadn't worn pantyhose so that I could feel the cool sand under my toes. Bill took his shoes and socks off with my loving urging.

     We had asked Kash not to include the "love, honor and obey" part of the vows but he accidentally started to anyway. All of us in near unison said, "Wait a minute, wait a minute..." since all knew we didn't want that read. He apologized, skipped over that part, and went on. When he had read the rest of the vows and Bill had repeated his portion, he asked Bill if he had a few other words to say. Bill had thought of some meaningful things he wanted to say, but he faltered because of the overwhelming emotions he was feeling. He finally managed to say huskily, "I love you." I squeezed his hand gently, feeling my throat tightening up, too.

     When it came my turn, I was able to say a few words but they weren't the ones I had rehearsed. I think I mentioned something about being grateful for having found this man and being grateful for having all but one of my kids there to witness our union. Then we were pronounced husband and wife. We kissed and my kids expressed congratulations in cheerful and loving voices. Jeania admitted that she had cried.

     Bill took Kash back up to the parking lot, got the marriage certificate signed, and paid the fee. The kids went to the pool to swim, sit in the hot tub, play shuffleboard, and see if there was any more pizza left. I went over to a beach chair and collapsed. I was married again. My mind felt as expansive as the black night sky and I wondered what my future life was going to be like. The warm gulf air drifted over me. I couldn't imagine leaving this wonderful place. There was too much to enjoy in that night and too little time to enjoy it. Tomorrow was going to be exhausting when we started the moving process.

     I waited in the chair knowing, hoping, that Bill would seek me out. He was taking a long time so I stood up to go find him. Then, I saw his shadowy figure come out onto the sand. He met up with me and I lead him down by the shoreline. Now, I could finally sit on the beach with a companion and drink in the romantic night air. Picking a spot close to the water, I pulled Bill down on the sand. We sat hand-in-hand, quiet, taking in the knowledge that now we were joined in marriage. The only thing missing was a full moon.

     The privacy of the night and sounds of the waves unwound our hectic evening. Finally, I wanted to go see what the kids were doing, and take a dive in the pool. Bill and I went up to the hotel room, after checking in with the group, to get our swimming suits. The room looked like it had had the air let out of it. Balloons hugged the corners of the room droopily. Discarded gift wrappings trailed on the floor. Wedding cake still waited to be cut. In the midst of changing into swim gear, we got a bit sidetracked and joined the leftover litter on the bed. Being married again made more sense to me than the nervous, questionable encounters I had had in the dating world. In the comfort of our newly established relationship, we celebrated our marriage alone before celebrating it with my children.

     We thought we would be able to leave by Sunday but the packing took much longer. I knew it would. The next evening, once we realized that we'd have to stay one more night, the whole clan met back at the hotel, Dan and Jeania, too. They wanted to take advantage of the swimming pool one more time. We all ended up staying up much too late. Bill and I had luxurious fun soaking in the hot tub and then cooling down in the crisp pool waters. He finally called it a night at 1:00 and I "tucked" him into bed. Since I snored so loudly, I was going back to my house so Bill could get get a good night's sleep. Instead of having Dan drive me home right away, I couldn't resist extending the night.

     My eyes kept closing as I tried to stay awake to watch them play shuffleboard. I really wanted to get up and play with them but I was exhausted. I had to be content with trying to look awake. It was my last night in Florida, and I didn't want the night to end. This was the last night in a life I had forged on my own for the past five years. I had come to find a good life in this warm and sunny paradise, I had come to find myself, I had come to heal. Having gotten a good start on all three of these goals, I was again taking a huge jump into the unknown--like I had done twice in the last nine months. I wouldn't be seeing my son Dan again for a long time. I would miss Jeania's sweet and funny ways. Lee would be with me for a few more days. We were dropping him off in Ohio where he was going to live with his dad. It was a night that I wanted to store in a bottle so I could uncap it on nostalgic days, pour a little of it out on the ground, and soak in its memories when needed.

     Eventually, at 4:00 a.m., Dan and Jeania drove Lee and me home. Bill needed my car to get over to the house in the morning so I left it at the hotel. Kip and Amy slept in the hotel room with Bill. Amy would use the bed the other double bed; Kip would lie on the floor. Their beds were already packed in the truck.

     As tired as I was, I still didn't want to let go of the night. It was my last night in a house I loved. A house with a pink grapefruit tree and a sweet tangerine tree in the backyard. How I loved going out in the morning during that winter and picking off big, fat globes of grapefruit and squeezing a pitcherful of juice for the day. It was a house that welcomed little lizards into it. How funny it had been to see the three black kittens and the two black and white kittens chase the lizards under the stove. Already, I missed having the lively, endearing bunch of them come and pounce all over me once they found I was awake in my room. They were gone now since we had managed to find homes for all of them. In the brightness of the light in my room, I fell asleep for what seemed like only moments.

     It was still much too early, about 11:00 a.m., when Bill and my kids arrived at the house to finish packing. We had to drag ourselves up because we HAD to get out of there that day. The last minute shuffle to just-get-everything-in-the-truck is the most tiring part of the whole job. Our breakfast was leftover wedding cake and pop. The grapefruit on the trees were hanging spoiled and rotten because it was past their season, or we would have also had juice to drink. It was mid-afternoon by the time I hastily dumped any leftovers I really wanted to take into one big box and declared us officially packed.

     Dan and Jeania showed up one more time to say goodbye. I left a lot of furniture and stuff in the house. The Salvation Army was coming by in the next day or two to take it all away. I told Dan to take anything he wanted before the Sally Ann came. We were too tired to give too tearful of a goodbye, but did manage a few lingering hugs. Then we were off, getting a much later start than we wanted to.

     It took four days to drive the 1400 miles north to Canada. Since we had gone to bed so late Saturday night, we stopped early in the afternoon in Georgia. The plan was to stop on the north side of Atlanta and then get a chance for Bill to meet my oldest son. But we stopped a lot further south of Atlanta. I called Grant in the morning to see if he could come down. It would take about an hour for him to get there. We didn't call him the night before because we had been too exhausted to stay up and have company. But, unfortunately, my son wasn't close enough to a phone for him to answer his beeper page before we left. I regretted not taking more time to see Grant but with such a long trip yawning ahead of us, the urgency was to press on.

     The rest of the trip was a test of endurance. We never fully recuperated from our late start. It's all an endless line of highway in my mind now. Highway stripes and being grateful for hotel stops is what I remember most. Kip and Amy took turns riding with Bill in the truck. Lee stayed with me the whole trip. I was driving my Honda. We stopped briefly in Columbus to drop Lee's things off at his dad's house, then continued north with Lee still with us. He was going to his girlfriend's house in Akron for a few days. After we let him off, we found a hotel in Akron to spend our last night in the U.S.

     On the fourth day of that long drive, we crossed the Canadian border about dinner time. In St. Catharine's, Ontario, half an hour past the border, Bill treated us to a classy restaurant on the lake. Again, we managed to make dinner interesting for Bill. Kip ordered the seafood platter for two as his dinner choice. He thoroughly enjoyed his fare despite the oddity of it. Amy and I had a good laugh while Bill politely pretended not to be red-faced.

     We crawled into Toronto by nightfall. My first encounter with the 401 was overwhelming. Try to imagine twelve lanes of traffic, and being nearly bumper-to-bumper at 100 km (60 mph) with impatient and impolite maniacs. Desperately, I kept my eyes on the determined back of the rental truck fearing what I'd have to go through if I lost sight of him. He was in the home stretch and on autopilot, I was in a foreign country full of foreigners and had no idea where we were going and I wasn't so sure I had his phone number on me. There was no way I was going to lose sight of him so I struggled to keep up. Soon, we were pulling into the underground garage of one of the many high-rise apartment buildings I had seen on the way there.

     It has been six and a half years now since we got together and every week we are more certain that we made the best decision of our lives when we decided to marry each other. We both had a lot of adjustments to make. Us to a different country and to him; him to suddenly having three strange Americans in his life and to being a stepfather. We are so thankful that we judged right via our e-mail. We took a big risk, we both admitted it, even though it was a calculated one. How nice it has been to find out that all of my instincts about him were positively right. And he says the same of me plus he says he got a bonus. He didn't know he was marrying such a good cook.

     If you have presevered to this point, I thank you for hanging in there and reading our story. An Internet romance is very tenuous and I think the ones that work out so successfully are in the minority. I don't recommend that you jump into one like I did. But don't be afraid to explore one if you have one going. My instincts were clouded with the first one that I tried that led me to Tennessee. I was inexperienced about the dating world and hungry for love. It's better if you can date someone who lives close by and who you can see in person every week or more. It's hard to get to know someone from a distance--to truly judge their character over a period of time when there is so much time in between seeing them. Being around them in real time is the only way to get to know them and the more exposure you have to them, the better informed about them you will be. Trust your instincts. And if there are any red flags popping out, listen to them carefully.

     If you have any comments and/or enjoyed this story, feel free to write me.