I think Cristina says it best when she calls us, "law students in love."

Cristina and I met while attending the University of San Diego School of Law in the Fall of 1998.

Cristina and I had both just moved to the area and neither of us knew a soul in San Diego. One evening early in the school year, in an effort to meet people I went to a bar that I knew to be frequented by USD law students.

The place was packed. After I got a beer I scanned the room for somewhere to sit. Lo and behold, I saw the most beautiful girl sitting in a booth in the corner with a couple of other girls. It looked like there was plenty of room left in their booth. "I know that girl," I thought, "she's a USD law student AND she lives in the same apartment complex as me." I took a moment to straighten myself up and run through my best romantic lines in my head before sauntering over to the girls table. When I got to the table I leaned in toward Cristina and said in my most charming voice, "Is this seat taken?"

"No, go right ahead," she said while pretending to be indifferent by looking away. But I knew that my masculine charms had turned her heart to jello. Soon we were chatting away. We talked about law school, music, travel, and anything else that popped into our heads. What I remember most about that first evening with Cristina was that we laughed, really laughed. I think that neither of us had encountered anything humorous since starting law school and there we were cracking one another up non stop. It was a wonderful feeling. When Cristina admitted that she was tired but that her freinds weren't ready to go yet, I offered to drive her back to her place since I lived in the same complex.

Cristina didn't realize what a mistake it was to let me drop her off at her apartment. Once I knew which apartment was hers I knocked on her door almost every day to ask her if she wanted to get some dinner or go on some other adventure that I had planned. At first I made sure that we went out with a group of freinds so as not to scare her off. But eventually I got her to go out with me alone. Later she even admitted that we were dating.

Here's a picture of Cristina and I about five months after we started dating:

Once she let me start dating her I knew that she would be mine. It took me two years to wear her down but she finally agreed to marry me.