AND NOW, HISTORY TAKES A DECIDEDLY SHARP TURN INTO BLISSVILLE

Although Ann and I have known each other since 1985, it was in a business sense. Pleasant enough, but business. She worked in human resources and I was a unit coordinator, our paths would cross from time to time at work, but never socially. Until the company christmas party of 1990.
She was there alone as was I..."Jill" was in Ohio and I'm not sure where Ann's husband was.
Well, I am, but that's not for me to say except that it wasn't jail.:P
Anyway, we struck up a conversation as a result of us both being kinda wall flowerish and ended up spending the bulk of the evening discussing the relative merits of heavy metal (Ann) and fringe english punk rock (me) over several beers.
She went home as did I, and that was it until the christmas party of 1993. She was there with a coworker and a childhood friend, I was there by myself. We were both unencumbered.
We spent a fair amount of time together as a group sequestered away at a corner table, just shooting the shit. There were definitely sparks flying, and that little black dress she was wearing was...uhh...well, it was fucking HOT.
This coincided with the downturn in business for the company, units were closing and many people were losing their jobs...the atmosphere was less than jolly. So, I invited Ann over to my house, and much to LT's chagrin and protests to the contrary, he ended up there too as kind of a reluctant chaparone, I guess.
I was playing music decidedly different from Ann's steady dose of slayer/venom/moxnix,and I threw in that lemonheads CD that I've mentioned (probably ad nauseum) here, "It's a shame about Ray".
Ann liked it, even though it was "kinda poppy". Coincidentally, the lemonheads were playing that next weekend in town, and I asked her if she would like to go see them with me. She said yes, which made me brave, so I tacked on a dinner before hand. She went for that too. SCORE!
So, off to dinner we go. Other than Ann trying to douse me with a giant glass of iced tea(she missed), it went off like you'd expect any first date for a couple that had been out of the dating scene for years.We were both very nervous and giddy, but we survived dinner and went to the show.
The Lemonheads were incredible, they created such a happy shiny vibe with their music that you could feel the love. Evan Dando (head lemonhead) was enamored by Austin and let us know his love for us with his between song banter, most of which involved the high quality of drugs available in our lovely little town.
I stole a kiss, and another,and another and before you know it, we're making out like bandits...Thank you Evan!:)
We came back to my house, kissed goodnight and Ann got in her car and went home.
There would be a date to the famous christmastime trail of lights and a couple of club shows before it got serious, and believe you me...it got serious.
We were madly,hopelessly in love. And, because we had known each other for so many years prior to the love thing, we were first friends.
And I believe that friendship is the primary reason we will celebrate our tenth wedding anniversary later on this month.
Don't misunderstand me...we are still those two lovestruck people simultaneously spilling and dodging iced tea, but we are still friends too.