that bus stop

I read an article years ago and may have already referenced it on this blog but it talks about knowing your family stories.  I am a softie, sentimental, a romantic, emotional, all of those type of descriptors apply to the kind of person I am.  I have luckily married a man who understands that about me and goes along with me, he is a good one. 

I LOVE OUR STORY

We try to tell our kids family stories, this story.

Who still has parents living in their childhood home? I do. They moved there in 1986 just before I turned 5 and started school, they are still there.  Graham's parents built houses and moved a few times, one house at the end of the street and then just three doors down from my parents, that very same street.  He spent the bulk of his childhood, adolescence there and then bought the house from his mom as a young 20 year old guy (the house three doors down from my childhood home).

Whenever we go up to visit our family in Fort McMurray we talk about our neighborhood, acknowledge the changes and tell our girls stories of where the forts were in the surrounding forest, we point out the 'love' rock and show them our old elementary schools, sometimes playing at the parks.  There is absolutely a feeling of nostalgia when we visit!

It is rather crazy that we didn't meet until we did.  We are only two years apart in age and know lots of the same people, hung out at some of the same places.  Had we met any earlier though I don't think things would have transpired as they did.  Why is the bus stop so special?  It is there we really 'met' for the first time.  Graham was working at Syncrude and I had been hired as a summer student laborer (I know, even saying laborer in relation to me is a laugh).  I was mostly painting and Graham was, well working on his trade.  We both kind of recognized one another from our 'hood but at the time Graham was getting a ride to work, while I took the diversified buses into the plant.  A week or so into my summer job stating, he walked around the corner at the end of our street with the purpose of taking the bus.  It was raining that morning and I asked if he wanted to come under my umbrella at the bus stop.  I really think that was the beginning of our story.  Everyday for the remainder of the summer we went in and out to work together, sometimes taking the bus and sometimes in his Chevy truck.  We learned a lot about one another on those 45 min drives in and back.  That didn't even count our dates in the evening.  What a whirlwind!

I was off to university in the fall, that was my plan.  One of my life's goals was to become a teacher and no dude was derailing that, I knew it was important for me to finish my education.   Into the fall we continued to date long distance while I attended the UofA and Graham came down, crashing at his mom's in Saint Albert or sometimes I went up.  It was in November when I came up for a concert that the bus stop was part of the next step in our lives, Graham proposed there after our concert. No wonder we love going to concerts together still?!?!?!

We always tell the girls stories, their birth stories, our bus stop story and stories about our dogs, stories about their grandparents.  This weekend in Fort McMurray was special because it was almost 15 years to the day that we got engaged at the bus stop, that important story location.  We had been out and as we drove back to Gramma and Grampa Hinko's Graham pointed out the bus stop and then we quickly calculated that it had been 15 years!!!  My sweet, sweet Mr. P whipped around so we could savor the moment and remember.  Amelia kindly took some photos and gosh do I love it, him and them - our little ladies!

It is crazy what becomes special, what things become iconic in our stories.  That bus stop, the old lamp post marking the diversified bus stop is important to us!  It is special to Graham and I, that bus stop.

~ Mr. & Mrs. P