<a href="http://www.halfwaytonormal.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/05/merryanns.jpg"><img class="alignnone size-full wp-image-365" title="merryanns" src="http://www.halfwaytonormal.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/05/merryanns.jpg" alt="" width="500" height="375" /></a>
<h5 style="padding-left: 360px;">Photo by Jason Berg</h5>
The first meal Jason and I ate together was lunch after church, at a bar called The Esquire. We had burgers, fries and beer, sitting outside with our kids and a group of maybe 10 or so other friends.

A few months later, the first time we were out together on sort-of-a-date, we drank martinis and danced at a place called Soma, then at 2 am we went to Merry Ann's, the all-night diner around the corner. That was the second meal we shared.
<h4>A date with a homeless man and a hangover stack</h4>
The diner was packed; there wasn't a single available table. The booths were big, though, and we were hungry and happy and eager to not lose the momentum building between us. <strong>In other words, we were determined to find a seat and extend the night.</strong> We decided to ask a homeless man, who was sitting alone in one of the big booths reading a book, if we could join him. He was surprised but seemed pleased.

His name was Dave, and we talked with him about his life while he ate his corned beef hash and Jason ate what's called the Hangover Stack, a ridiculous concoction that somehow combines all of the breakfast foods on the menu, tying it all together with a smothering of biscuit gravy. I don't remember what I ate—most likely fried eggs and toast with bacon, or maybe a grilled cheese, all gooey with that melted processed orange goodness that I never have at home but love to indulge in from time to time.

<strong>It's interesting to think of those specific, earliest moments when you were with that person you end up marrying, but you didn't really know him (or her). Every sentence spoken, every menu item ordered, is a clue to who they are. You're the detective, eager to uncover every scrap of evidence.</strong>

By the time we left Merry Ann's that night (at what—3:30 or 4 in the morning?) what did I know about Jason? I knew he didn't think it was at all strange to share a table with a stranger. Through conversation, after our new friend Dave left, Jason and I discovered that his dad and my mom both are the sort of people who will strike up extended conversations with homeless people, and even invite lonely and wandering souls to the house for Thanksgiving dinner.

<strong>I also discovered at Merry Ann's that Jason wasn't so overly health-conscious and sophisticated that he couldn't eat greasy diner food.</strong> I had recently gotten out of a relationship with someone who was too healthy and sophisticated to have fun—who always made me feel uncultured and very Midwestern for craving a big burger or eggs and bacon. <strong>Jason made me feel comfortable and simply free to be myself—to follow whatever craving I might have.</strong>

But the next day I panicked a little bit. <strong>What if Jason didn't have good taste? Like at all—ever?</strong> What if his idea of a nice dinner out was Outback Steakhouse? Or his concept of "interesting food" was takeout Chinese?

Anyone who knows anything about Jason—certainly anyone who read my previous post about the chicken masala Jason cooked for us last week—knows that fear was ridiculous. But I had no idea then! <strong>And I wanted to know I could be myself with him in the midst of whatever mood I was in, whether I was craving tuna tartare or a basket of onion rings.</strong>
<h4>Being real about my greasy &amp; sophisticated sides</h4>
It was actually my reflections on <a href="http://www.halfwaytonormal.com/?p=362">that recent post</a> that led me to write this one. Sometimes, after I write a post, I start to over-think it and pick it apart. Shocking, I know! This generally happens if I have reason to think my readers didn't respond to it as exuberantly and prolifically as they generally do. <strong>In other words, it happens when I'm feeling insecure.</strong> That's how I was feeling about 12 hours after publishing the post about curry and embracing complexity.

"Maybe people were feeling swamped at work after a long weekend," I said to Jason, after confessing that I was trying to figure out why I only had a few comments on the post. "And I didn't get it up there until after noon. A lot of people read blogs first thing in the morning."

"Yeah, I know I was super swamped at work all day," Jason said helpfully.

"But maybe people didn't like it because it sounded like I was trying to point out how great my life is," I said. <strong>"People like my posts when I talk about how I've messed up, and how I struggled through divorce. They like it when I write about my messy house and my annoyance with my kids, and with other Christians. </strong>This post was about how well we eat, and how interesting all our friends are. Well, it was supposed to be about embracing complexity, but it made our life look really great in the process."

I don't have any idea if I was on to something, but if nothing else, it inspired this post, which is at least partly about that—about setting the record straight. I don't eat chicken masala and Chengdu hotpot every night for dinner. In fact, we had all white friends over on Memorial Day, and grilled hot dogs.

<strong>But as it turns out, this post is mostly about Jason, and love, and finding someone you can be <em>you</em> with, in every permeation of who you are.</strong> And most of us, after all, are full of contradictions.

<strong>Today is our second wedding anniversary</strong>. For lunch, we picked up big slices of pepperoni and sausage pizza, and ate them on the porch. For dinner, we went to Baccaro, which was actually the scene of our first official date. To celebrate who we are, as individuals and together, we shared a bottle of wine and ate some of the most exquisite food you can find anywhere in the world. <strong>And we were thankful that, in our relationship, there is no such thing as a contradiction. It's all just about being who we are.</strong>

<a href="http://www.halfwaytonormal.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/05/jasonbaccaro.jpg"><img class="alignnone size-full wp-image-366" title="jasonbaccaro" src="http://www.halfwaytonormal.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/05/jasonbaccaro.jpg" alt="" width="500" height="434" /></a>
<h5 style="padding-left: 330px;">Photo by Kristin Tennant</h5>