Happy Birthday @Summerbeth!

By @edent · Liz lockdown love meta personal · 300 words

I started dating Liz - my now wife - one cold January back at university. We were young and disgustingly in love. This was it - 💕true love💕! And then, right in our honeymoon phase, she left to Australia for the summer holidays.

We both wailed and made overly dramatic speeches about how we'd stay true to each other. And we'd write every day! And nothing would tear us apart!

Those eleven weeks sssuuuuuccccckkkkkeeeeddddd! Skype hadn't been invented, and long distance calls were prohibitively expensive to us students. Timezones made IM chatting difficult. Emails and the odd letter made things just about bearable. But there was a profound sense that we needed to be in each other's arms. When she eventually came back - we vowed never to be apart for so long again.

Today is Liz's birthday. And, by happy coincidence, we've been locked up together for eleven weeks and one day. We've slain the dragon! I don't think we've ever spent so much time permanently in each other's company.

There's no one I'd rather be confined with. She's a sparkling wit, tough under pressure, a fierce defender of her opinions, and really good at video games.

Sure, we've bickered a bit in lockdown - who hasn't? - but she always knows the way to my heart.