#7

It was the Christmas of 2003. Over the few days before Christmas I had developed a bit of a cold. By Christmas morning my illness was fully roosting in my body. I had been dating Nicole for about 4 months, but we were not yet engaged, so it was natural for her to spend Christmas with her family. I was not feeling well enough to accompany my family up to my brother Nate's new house in Hesperia for Christmas up there. So I sat home all afternoon/evening by myself. I called Nicole to talk to her and she told me that she was bored and that her family had seen a movie with Ben Affleck in it and that they did not even get to sit with each other at the theater. My only desire was to order a pizza, but alas, there were no pizza places that were open, so I had to eat a microwaveable meal. I remember watching the first Pirates of the Caribbean movie that evening. The reason this Christmas is memorable to me is that I remember thinking that night "I would like to spend my Christmases with Nicole". My throat ended up getting so bad that I had to visit Kaiser the next morning. It was not long later that I bought the engagement ring that would lead to my proposal on February 14 not two months later.