“I love you,” I say.
 
“I love you back,” she replies.
 
“I love you,” I’ll repeat a bit later on adding, “My beautiful bride.”
 
“Thank you for lovin’ me,” she says back. “But you’re the cute one.”
 
“It’s easy,” I reply, “But you’re the beautiful bride one.”
 
“My blind man. I’m goofy lookin’.”
 
I do not say, “Not to me.” I won’t allow even the most remote consideration live for a second. I won’t allow that anyone else harbor such as sentiment. "No you're not. You're my beautiful bride."
 
My wife and I met on-line – quite accidentally. No, that isn’t right. I believe there was divine intervention. I’d been single for a number of years and living in a smallish, close-knit community, I felt that I might experiment with on-line dating. Not finding success after several meetings, my sister, who lives several states away, suggested a particular Christian website. So I signed up. I thought.
 
Actually, I joined one that I thought was the one she suggested, but was not. My future bride, also unsuccessful in her on-line efforts, was giving the Christian dating site one month. We connected with a single week left on her trial subscription.
 
The picture that she’d supplied was grainy, and while not necessarily blurry, was taken from a distance, far enough back to get her full body within the frame. All I could tell was that inside the floor length dress was probably an average sized frame. But by then, I’d learned not to put much credit in the photo, since my experience was that the photos were all too often dated and misrepresentative.
 
All that I say to highlight my next remark – I fell in love with her brain first. We communicated for the week remaining on her term, then moved to another dating site in which we both had membership. Then we moved on to email, probably exchanging dozens of conversations before ever sharing a phone call.
 
At our first meeting, 121 miles away incidentally, we exchanged hostages. Of course, we’d learned that we both enjoyed writing, so we exchanged writings, one of mine for one of hers. I learned that she was, indeed, as intelligent, and thoughtful, and witty, and funny, as I’d learned over the course of the previous month, or so.
 
Within four months of our first meeting, Debbie became my beautiful bride. Now, nearly twelve years later, she’s still my beautiful bride. The only difference between then and now, our on-line discourse and our married life… now it isn’t only her mind that I love, just the part of her that I loved first.