Another year (& thank you Glider)

y0su

Finland7871 Posts

July 25 2015 08:49 GMT

As the title suggests this is some sort of anniversary blog... My wedding anniversary! I guess "our" is more appropriate but no one here knows my wife - yet.

Last year (our 5th) I commissioned a portrait by TL's very own Glider! THANK YOU! :D

+ Show Spoiler +

Traditionally wood gifts are given to celebrate, I figured charcoal on paper was close enough.

I'm not much of a blogger (my previous, and only, use of this space wasn't quite a blog). Normally I would be spending my time differently on this occasion. However, my wonderful wife has a night shift tonight and is sleeping in to prepare for it. I'll talk more about that soon- I want to do this chronologically.

We met eight years ago when she got hired at the place I worked. I was immediately captured by her beautiful smile. We worked at a 911 (emergency) dispatch center working 12h A/B shifts so unless you worked on the same shift you only other employees at BOS/EOS. However, if you worked the same shift, you were with people for a quarter of ~~the week~~ your life. That happened when she was moved to my shift to be trained on different positions - I was her CTO. <Insert joke about training her on different positions >

We dated, moved in and became engaged (the portrait is of the first picture my dad took after she got the ring). Now, I really believe that you shouldn't "dip your pen in company ink". We ~~were~~ are special, I'm sure many others have had successful relationships with co-workers but for every one that works there's probably five that result in searching for new work (yes, I'm pulling that out of my ass). In fact, while we were dating I was turned down from a big promotion after disclosing our relationship (the promotion went to another guy who didn't disclose his workplace gf..).

We got married six years ago today (depending on your time zone - in fact when I started writing it wasn't yet midnight on the pacific coast). It was an amazing cliff side wedding on California's central coast. The clouds parted and the sun lit up the water just before the wedding. She walked down the aisle to the same song in the video (a piano solo of Journey's Faithfully). It was beautiful - I nearly cried.

Our honeymoon was to the country of my birth, Finland. We visited my mother's family, saw the country and relaxed at a summer lakeside cottage. All conveniently during the only two consecutive weeks of summer the country gets! She loved it and I've always dreamed of someday living there.

Both of us wanted more than our dispatch jobs. She had ambitions towards being hands on in emergency situations and I just wanted something else after losing out on the promotion. Moving to Finland allowed us both to study. I'm still in school for Electrical Engineering. She has become fluent in Finnish (apparently one of the hardest languages to learn) and is eligible for Finnish citizenship! She also graduated last winter and is working her dream job as a trauma nurse! Which brings me back to why she's stuck working a night shift tonight and I'm up writing a blog about us. :D

Cauld

United States350 Posts

July 25 2015 12:01 GMT

5/5 everything about this blog is awesome. How long ago did you move to Finland? How long did it take your wife to become fluent, and did she have any experience in similar languages, etc.?

Azhrak

Finland1198 Posts

July 25 2015 12:06 GMT

On July 25 2015 21:01 Cauld wrote:
did she have any experience in similar languages, etc.?

FYI, only Estonian is similar to Finnish so I highly doubt it.

Also, Finnish spoken language is not the hard part, it's the written language that is a real pain for foreign people. Spoken language can be learned in a year or so if you can practice a lot (i.e. live in Finland).

As for the blog, it's really well written and a pleasure to read. Glad to hear you guys are doing well.

y0su

Finland7871 Posts

July 25 2015 12:15 GMT

Thanks!
We moved 5 years ago. She started slowly learning basics a year before (occasional lessons with my mom) and then intense classes right when we moved. She's pretty much constantly been taking language courses around her school and over the last two years has been working (practical training) in Finnish. She took the typical year or two of Spanish in HS but no other language experience besides English.