Our Love Story

Tomorrow Luke and I will be returning to Pau, France to attend a friend's wedding, after nearly four years of being away. Pau holds special significance for us as it is the place our relationship began and I thought I'd take this opportunity to share our love story.

In January 2009 I left Las Vegas to study abroad at the Université de Pau in France. Whilst there I lived with a French woman named Domi and her son, Yann. It was Domi who told me about an English stagiaire who worked for her that she wanted introduce to me. Sure enough, when I checked my Facebook that first night I found a message waiting in my inbox.

Hi Erin,

I stumbled across you on the Pau study abroad group. My boss has just taken in an American called Erin and I put two and two together.

Hope you're settling in and getting on with Domi.

If you want to be shown around or need any advice I'm happy to help. I've been here 4 months and my flatmate is French so we could be useful. Lol.

Luke

PS Domi has my number

Luke and I met that Friday and while I wouldn't call it love at first sight (I don't believe in it) there was a definite connection from the moment we met. We began seeing each other soon after and it was just casual. I was going back home to America and Luke was returning to England after our time together in France after all.

The first night we met at L'Esprit in Pau. Paul-Etienne (L) is our friend getting married.

I don't think either of us ever thought it would turn in to anything serious but much to our surprise it did. We're not sure exactly when, perhaps it was when we went to San Sebastián together, you can read more about that here. Next thing we knew I was going on holiday with him to meet his family and my parents were flying over to France to meet him! As my host mother often teases, meeting Luke certainly didn't improve my French.

 

Meeting Luke's family at Park Güell (Gaudi Gardens) in Barcelona

Meeting my parents at Place Clémenceau in Pau

After my time in France, I spent a month in England with Luke before I returned to America to finish my university degree. Leaving Luke in England was one if not the hardest thing I've ever done in my life. I sobbed from the moment I walked through security at London-Heathrow and didn't stop until I landed in Las Vegas.

Having a long-distance relationship was hard, anyone who has ever had one can tell you that. We missed each other a lot and it's difficult to be apart for special occasions. Even when I was enjoying myself I always knew one thing that would make any occasion better - his presence. I never felt like we weren't going to survive the distance. I think a lot of people are sceptics when it comes to long-distance relationships, I myself used to be, but for the right person anything is possible.

In June 2010 I graduated from university (with a BA Honors in Film Studies and French might I add) and after what seemed like an eternity, made the move across the pond to England. You know the story from there.

Luke and I at Disney's California Adventure (December 2012)

Q: What is your love story? Do you have a place that has a special meaning to you?

Erin x

San Sebastián Memories

Bad photos, we all have them and some of us more than others. When I got my first digital camera, I thought it would be the end of the bad photos of my disposable camera days. Now I know the digital camera is not a miracle worker - it just put an end to waiting to find out that you were pulling a gormless face that previously might have taken weeks to discover. But what if you could go back a have a retake of one of your bad photos, which would you choose?

When I first read the premise behind Russell's 'No More Bad Photos Competition' I thought it was going to be difficult to choose a photo, but once I sat down to write my entry one photo jumped out at me immediately. It was the first "couple" photo of Luke and I, taken on our first weekend away together to San Sebastián in March 2009.

Luke and I met during my first week in Pau, when we were introduced by my host mother, Domi, who was Luke's boss. (My apologies to the ones who already know this story.) We began dating almost immediately after meeting, but everything was casual. After all at the end of the summer I would be going back to America and Luke to England. The idea of it being anything serious, at the time, seemed impossible.

To this end, perhaps to convince ourselves more than anything, we tried to steer clear of what I would call "coupley" things. We didn't have any photos of just the two of us, if we were in a photo together someone else was always with us. We didn't call ourselves boyfriend and girlfriend. And perhaps most important of all, we didn't have the "so where is this going?" conversation that seems to plague so many relationships.

Our bubble of avoidance was shattered in mid-March when Luke asked if I would be interested in going away with him for the weekend, just the two of us. We considered going to Biarritz, but we had gone there a number of times already with our group of friends. Plus there was a strong likelihood that our friends would get the urge to go to the beach and join us. So we decided on San Sebastián - home of tapas, Basque cuisine, surfing, and the most Michelin star restaurants.

We spent the weekend laying on the beach, eating amazing Spanish cuisine, and visiting the same gelato place more times than I can remember. We taken a number of photos of each other but so far didn't have one of the two of us together. That changed on our last day on top of the San Sebastián Aquarium (we also discovered our mutual love of aquariums) when we finally had our first couple photo.

It is a little dark on our faces, and the pose is awkward because rather than find someone to take it for us, Luke is holding his hand out. But it still makes our photo album because it is our first.We may have fallen in love in Pau, but San Sebastián is where it all changed for us. I had no idea then that three years down the line I would be living in England, married to the incredible man posing right next to me.

We've often talked about going back to San Sebastián, the place where our relationship changed to the more  serious. Someday we will, and we'll pose on top of the Aquarium like we did that day, but this time I think we'll ask a passer-by to take the photo for us.

Remember: The truly bad photos are the ones that don’t exist at all.

Erin x

Entry for In Search of a Life Less Ordinary's 'No More Bad Photos Competition'