All couples have the story of how they met. Ours comes with a small bit of fate – if you even believe in that sort of thing. It was Christmas-time and the charity I worked for was throwing a small bash to thank our local volunteers and meet some of our vendors. It even included an uptight board member or two. My future husband-to-be was not officially invited. He had other plans that night; however, his date canceled at the last minute to finish her holiday shopping. So, he called his good friends, Peter and Jo, to see what they were up to. Jo, being Jo, invited him to join them at my party. They were only about 15 minutes ahead of him and, she cajoled, the charity was chock-full of single women. She was not lying about that. Ten of the eleven employees were young women. Of course, since she had never met any of us, she did not vouch for our attractiveness.

I got their side of the story from them at a later date. Apparently, they had scoped me out and then engaged me in witty repartee until the unknown man of my dreams arrived. We were already fast friends by the time Dave turned up – aided a bit by some very strong margaritas – and in no time we were all chatting as if we'd known each other for years. It goes without saying, I gave him my card – though it was the first time in my life I had agreed to go on a date with a man who until recently was a total stranger. I regretted it a little in the morning, but he was cute, seemed nice and it's hard for me to turn down free food. Unfortunately, the date would have to wait until after the New Year as I was going back East for the holidays. This only added to both our nerves, but clearly that first dinner went well or I wouldn't be telling this story. (We've been together ever since.)

Of course, his next move might have ruined everything if I was a different sort of girl...and a bit less self-confident...

Working with a bunch of women, was often like re-attending high school only with legal drinking. They all knew about my Friday date and when Monday morning came along I felt like a simple house cat pounced on by a pack of starving wolves. They weren't completely out of line. This was the first real date I'd had since the end of a long term relationship. They screamed for details, which I dolled out sparsely just to get them to leave me alone with my secret joy.

And then it happened. The largest bouquet of flowers any of us had ever seen came through the door and landed on my desk. I was speechless. It was at least 3' high and wide' – not counting the vase – and filled with at least 2 dozen roses and an uncountable myriad of other blossoms. It looked like he bought out the entire store. (I'm not exaggerating. We filled up three other vases with some of the flowers and it wasn't even dented.) My joy quickly turned to horror when they all turned to me and teasingly asked: "You slept with him, didn't you?"

Flowers only equal sex, when men are trying to get something, (i.e. sex) or after marriage (when they're obligated by Hallmark holidays.) Clearly, his feelings about the past weekend were quite obvious. (Yeah, we had a second date on Sunday night, but I never told my catty co-workers that. It was none of their business.) His open-hearted courting caused me to run away – just a bit – but I couldn't hide. He was the best thing that ever happened to me. He swears he only paid about $50 dollars for the flowers, but claims he couldn't stop talking about me to the florist, so she must had padded the arrangement. What a softy. You'd think she'd be used to stories of new love.

He has never equaled that first bouquet in size or grandeur, but he does keep our home filled with blooms the whole year long by creating arrangements from our own garden. Instead of spending money on a hall we'd use for an hour, we decided to get married in our backyard and remodeled the whole area for the occasion. It was the perfect setting: private, intimate, filled with beauty and, lucky for us that day, plenty of sunshine. (It rained so much leading up to the big event all the plants grew twice as much. The inclement weather also saved us quite a bit of money on our water bill...which inevitably went right back into the wedding.)

We've remodeled our backyard a few times since then, adding more and more roses each time, which are easier to take care of than we thought and, in Southern California, never stop blooming.  I feed, he cuts. We have over 50 different varieties, which gives him more than enough color to play with and a few moments to step away from his hectic urban life and enjoy some time with nature. He occasionally catches himself on a thorn, but his efforts are always appreciated.

Unfortunately, for him, he still never gets out of buying flowers for Valentine's Day. Sure, it's a made-up event, but traditions are traditions. One of ours is cutting the roses back in January on Martin Luther King Day, leaving me and my desk flowerless until early March when they regain their strength and begin blooming again. Fate is a fickle bitch. Sometimes, no matter how much you try, you just can't beat the system. 

Lisa Dinsmore is an amateur writer, web programmer, movie and wine lover. She currently runs two review websites to share her passions: www.crazy4cinema.com and www.dailywinedispatch.com.

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