How I Met and Married Janelle

I first heard the name Janelle Swan shortly after my parents returned from their first trip to Zambia. My mother circulated an e-mail that Miss Swan had composed about the witch craft trials that were taking place around Sakeji at that time, in which several men from the assemblies there were accused of witchcraft. I noticed that the e-mail was very well written and the stress and emotion of the situation were evident in its tone. I read the e-mail, and deleted it.

In my mind's eye, I saw Janelle as a tall beautiful girl, probably a few years older than me and definitely out of my league. Not that I even considered whether or not there was a possibility of me even ever meeting her, much less ever being with her. It was a foregone conclusion that she was too beautiful, too smart, and too good for me.

The next time I heard the name, it was a few years later and I was on the telephone with my little sister, Sophie. She had gone to Zambia with my parents and had spent some time with Janelle at Sakeji. I was on the phone with Sophie because my girlfriend Erica and I had just broken up. I was very lonely and so I had prayed for someone to keep me company and that very night Sophie called for no particular reason. Anyways, we were talking and somehow, Jill Avery's name came up. Jill Avery works at Sakeji School in Zambia. That triggered something in Sophie's memory and she exclaimed, "Patrick! I know the perfect girl for you!" It was Janelle. She told me how beautiful and wonderful and funny and smart Janelle was. I was skeptical and thought nothing more of it. In fact, I completely forgot this conversation for a long time.

Months, possibly even more than a year later, I was in Toronto working with Stephen Vance's Good News Outreach for the summer. One of my coworkers was Vince Kember. He knew Janelle from when she went to university in Ottawa. Anyways, for some reason, her name kept coming up in our conversations, you see Vince was crazy about Janelle. He kept telling me that if she was any younger, he would marry her and that I should meet her because I'd like her and that we were very much alike and would probably like each other a lot. Of course, I was skeptical.

It was towards the end of that summer, I remember I was stacking chairs after another children's meeting in the tent when Vince came in and took me to the other tent where he introduced me to Janelle. She had stopped to see him while driving through on her way to a wedding in the Stratford area. I stood to the side, kind of awkwardly, and Vince introduced us. I said, "You have crazy hair." I might have stood there for a few more minutes, but I said nothing more and then split.

I was right. Janelle was beautiful. Of course, I never made the connection that this was the same Janelle Swan that Sophie had told me about until much later. Again, however, I thought that she was too beautiful, too smart, and too good for me. I thought nothing more of her.

The summer ended and I enrolled in classes at York University's Glendon College. I moved into Mark and Jason's apartment where I spent two months on the couch before Tim moved out and I moved into his room. It was pretty tedious and lonely. I hung out with Stacy and Sarah a lot--they were awesome friends, even if their dad was a little crazy. I went to classes, I explored the city and the subway. (I was crazy about the subway.) And then Vince (who had gone back to Ottawa and was now attending classes at the University of Ottawa) told me about a conference in Montreal, he invited me to go with his family and Ciela. I bought a bus ticket to Ottawa and after a strange fiasco and major mix up I met up with Vince and his family. Then I broke Vince's expensive glasses. I spent the weekend and a couple of days in Ottawa with Vince, his family, and Ciela. It was pretty cool and I even considered moving to Ottawa.

When I got back to Toronto, Vince and I were chatting on MSN again and Janelle's name came up. Vince had sent her to my website and she had read my poems and stuff and told Vince that she liked them. He told me that she would probably like to "meet" me, so I asked for her e-mail address and added her to my MSN list. We immediately began chatting and I discovered that, in addition to being beautiful, smart, and good, she was also very likeable and nice. We hit it off and began chatting regularly, sometimes for up to four or more hours at a time.

After about a week of this, I invited Janelle to my parent's house for Christmas. I wasn't really expecting her to accept, I was hoping she would, but I thought it would be too much to hope for and definitely too soon. It turned out, Janelle was more daring and courageous than I had expected and she agree. I was pretty excited, but trepiditious enough to tell everyone that it was my parents who had invited her. Anyways, we kept chatting, I really, really liked her and was pretty sure she felt the same way about me. By the time Christmas arrived, I was pretty sure that I would be falling in love with her when I saw her.

She arrived on a Saturday evening on the train and I met her at Union station. She looked great, I thought she was beautiful. We were nervous at first but we got along quite well. I took her back to the apartment I shared with Mark and Jason and made her some pancakes for supper. We spent the next day together in Toronto, went to meeting and all that stuff, and on Monday morning we boarded the train for Cochrane. My parents were supposed to meet up at the station in Cochrane and take us home, but the train broke down on the way and what was supposed to be an eight or nine hour train ride stretched into a seventeen hour train ride. We didn't mind. We talked, held hands, and fell completely and madly in love.

We arrived at my parent's house in the wee hours of the morning. Mom woke up, made us some food and hung out with us for a little bit. Then we went to bed. The next morning I got up and found Janelle in the kitchen with mom, and greeted her with a great big hug. She was awesome and I loved her like crazy. It didn't take long before we were kissing all the time and I intended to ask her to marry me before she went back to Nova Scotia. My family loved her, she got along great with everyone, it was lots of fun and very exciting.

One afternoon we took a walk. It was short walk because it was very cold. Janelle asked me what we were, what our relationship was because I hadn't asked her to be my girlfriend or anything yet and I planned to ask her to marry me. I didn't exactly know what to say so I think I made something up that we could call each other until I asked her to marry me. I would have to buy a ring first. Anyways, I can't remember what it was that we were going to call each other.

So after Christmas, Chad and Leanne drove us back to Toronto and the next morning I took Janelle to the train station. I had bought the ring a day or two before we left Kapuskasing. On the way to the train station we stopped by the giant elephant sculpture at the CIBC plaza at Yonge and King, and then walked along King Street. We came to the St. James Anglican Cathedral and the doors were open so I asked if she'd like to go in. We went in, sat down, talked for a while. It was very emotional because she was going to be leaving in a few minutes. Eventually I worked up the courage to ask, "If I gave you my ring, would you wear it?" And then I got down on one knee and, presenting the ring and stuttering a little, I asked her if she would marry me. Instead of saying "Yes" or "No" like normal people, though, she said "Shut up!!" and then repeated it again as if I hadn't heard the first time, and said it again and again.

Anyways, she eventually got around to saying yes. We called her parents who gave us their blessing and then went to Union Station and she got on the train and disappeared. It was very lonely after that. I was slow telling people about it. I went home and went to bed and slept until Chad called to tell me that I'd forgot my suit in his car, I didn't tell him. Later on my mom called and I told her and she told my dad and we talked for a while. My dad was a little nervous, but he was okay with it. I can't remember who I told next. I eventually told Chad, but I can't remember if it was before or after my mom told him. Anyways, everyone eventually found out.

After that we had to plan on a date. We decided not to wait for too long and opted originally for a wedding in June but then we changed it to May 20.

I flew to Halifax in February for Spring Break and spent ten days with Janelle and her sisters and their families. We went to the beach and I fell in love with the ocean. The ten days went by too fast and I flew back to Toronto again. School ended for me, I took a job tutoring a few people. It wasn't very lucrative. I decided to leave the city and took the train to Kapuskasing. I spent the month of April and some of May at my parent's house. Time dragged by.

And then on May 10, I flew to Halifax. Janelle picked me up at the airport. We were very nervous and excited. Ten days flew by, people kept coming in, we spent more time at the airport picking people up than anywhere else, I think. And then we got married. It was a really fun wedding, I think. I liked it a lot.

We had a nice honeymoon at Peggy's Cove. The only thing I regret is insisting that we go to meeting on Sunday morning. After that, we drove through Northern Quebec to Kapuskasing in Janelle's parent's car where they hosted another reception for us, for the people who didn't make it to the wedding. A few days later, we drove to Stratford, where we moved into Chad and Leanne's house. They were going to Germany for a couple months and we were going to babysit their house, so we spent the summer in Stratford and moved to a tiny one bedroom apartment in Toronto at the end of August ...