Weddingbee Blog

The story of Mr. and Miss Mary Jane began in late 2006, when I got a job with Small Department. In early 2007, the boss announced that after a long search, we would be hiring someone for an open position. This someone’s name sounded very familiar, so I did what I often do when I feel this way: I went home and cracked open my high school yearbooks. I only live 20 miles from the town where I grew up, so when I recognize a name, it’s usually with good reason.

I found him and put a (younger, teenage) face to the name. So you see, the story of us has an interesting prequel: Mr. Mary Jane and I actually went to the same elementary, junior, and high school. It wasn’t a big high school, but we were both pretty anti-social, so we did not know each other then. We were friends with a few of the same people though, and we even were in the choir together for a few years. Weeeeeird. Anyway, despite all of this school history, I really didn’t know this person aside from a vague recollection based on the grainy yearbook photo.

He started work at Small Department soon after the boss announced his hire. Shortly after that, he let me know that he had recognized MY name too. We each admitted that we’d been ’investigating’ each other from afar. (Who was this high-school stranger?!) We started to have polite conversations from time to time… sometimes in our offices, other times over instant messenger (Big Company has many buildings and uses IM to communicate for work purposes a lot, so it’s OK, reeeeally!). Eventually we added each other to our “home” IMs as well, and started chatting in the evenings. We shared a lot: anything from current interests, to life goals, to past relationships. We started going to lunch together sometimes too, and then started taking what we called “photo trips”. (We found that we were both into photography, so we’d drive around and look for stuff to take photos of.)

By the end of the year, we decided we’d make a good pair. (Seriously, when I said we talked about everything, I meant ev-reee-thang. We listed our good and bad qualities and what we’d have to offer the other person as a partner… all that good stuff!)

The rest is, well, history! We moved in together shortly after that, met each other’s families (no one could believe we were “right under each other’s noses” all that time growing up), and are now planning our low key marriage ceremony for this fall!

Did you and your FI have a “common past” before you met?