Finally, after 25 years...

Most of you know this story, but for those that dont... Kip and I (Bekah) met in 1998 in a Marilyn Manson chat room on AOL before AIM was even a thing. We - AcidRayine and Lilith121 - were 17 and about to enter our senior year of high school. We quickly bonded over music and art, among other things. The internet was expensive back then, and I often got into trouble for using it (oops!). Long-distance calls weren't cheap either. The summer after graduation I flew from Connecticut down to Georgia for a visit, which led to a second visit shortly after. As the summer drew to a close, we knew that we didn't want to be apart any longer. Kip flew up to Connecticut, learned to drive stick shift from my mom, and we both drove back down to Georgia. We had no idea what we were getting ourselves into! We were two young people who were madly in love, but we were naïve and knew nothing about being in a serious relationship with another person. The following year, the relationship ended and I moved back to Connecticut. Our lives went in wildly different directions. It wasn't until 20 years later, in 2018, that we reconnected on Facebook. I was living in South Carolina with my two daughters, Eva and Lorelei. Kip was in Georgia with his two sons, Atticus and Allister. I was having one of the worst years of my life, and Kip reached out to offer support. So, the internet brought us together again. It's crazy that after living on opposite sides of the country we had ended up living only 3 hours away from one another. After a few years of close friendship, we realized that we were still very much in love. And now, 25 years later, we are ecstatic to be blending our families and spending our lives together.