My mom, dad, sister, aunt, and I were in the car on the way to Thanksgiving dinner last year. I sat snugly in the middle seat between my sister and aunt. A few months into college, it had recently become known amongst my relatives that I had begun dating someone. I knew questions would arise, but I didn’t feel ready to talk about it.
“So, Mel, how’d you and this boy meet?” my aunt asked me, smiling at me intently, full of sincerity and curiosity about the new life I was living away at school. I felt my face turning red and wished I had taken off my winter coat. I laughed nervously, not making much eye contact. “Uhhh. We met at the library. Well, through...um…mutual friends,” I stammered. I regretted lying immediately.
Halfway through dinner in middle of an unrelated conversation, I blurted out, “Wait, I need to say something." Everyone went quiet, and all eyes were on me. I proceeded to explain to my aunt that I had lied to her in the car because I was embarrassed about how my boyfriend and I met. She was sweet about it; she forgave me, and we laughed together, but my face turned bright red all over again.
A similar situation happened about six months later with relatives on the other side of my family. This time it happened in the kitchen of my other aunt's house with several cousins and a handful of aunts gathered around me. One of them asked me, “Mel, how’d you two meet?” and I gave the same flakey, eye contactless response I gave to my aunt on Thanksgiving. This time I didn’t have heart to correct myself—my younger cousins were around, and I wanted to set a good example (nothing sounds more wholesome than meeting at the library).
I have felt guilty about not telling the truth ever since, and since these two situations, I have contemplated the importance of the “how we met” story in any relationship, wondering why I felt so embarrassed about mine in the first place. In September 2014, my boyfriend and I met on Tinder. It all began when one afternoon I sat in the dorm common room with a handful of my suitemates while they sifted through Tinder profiles. I thought I would join in the fun and see what I was missing out on. A few days later just before I thought I would delete the app, my then future boyfriend messaged me a simple, “Hey! What’s up?” and I decided I would give him a chance.
It’s considered unusual and even controversial to have met your significant other on Tinder. The app has a reputation of not being for serious relationships, but really it doesn’t have to be "for" anything in particular. It’s simply an app that connects humans to other humans, and there is nothing shameful or embarrassing about that. If I hadn’t downloaded the app, I wouldn’t have met one of the most important people in my life.
I didn’t download Tinder for any particular reason, though. I didn’t expect to meet anyone at all—the fact that I happened to meet my boyfriend out of it was just by chance. It’s something we laugh about now, and I've come to consider as something that makes our relationship unique, not something to lie about and make a cover story for. What matters most of all, though, is that we have a year and four months (and counting) of memories and experiences shared together. In the scheme of things, the story of how we met is only a tiny detail.
