Brazilian fiancé out of status

[justashooter 430]

Nobody chooses internet chat as a substitute for courting. Some people simply have no choice.

You're very fortunate if you were able to do all of those things before getting married. Most of us are not that lucky.

oh, come on, jim. that's like saying mice ate all of those holes in swiss cheese.

nobody is born with a "fiancee". we all choose our spouses. some of us choose people we meet in a street market. some of us choose people we meet on the internet. we all know where the people are before we consider them as mates.

we all have opportunities to meet people face to face, and some of us choose to do so, while others choose not to.

you seem like a very well organised guy. you are very logical in processing information, in general. how you missed the obvious logic in this question would seem an unanswerable question. the truth is that the answer lies within you. i'm sure you already know what it is.

I've had two prior spouses, and I didn't "choose" either of them. I had no say in the matter. For reasons I'll probably never fathom, I just fell in love with them. Love is one of those intangibles that just escapes normal logic. If you can gain enough insight into someone using email, online chat, or even writing letters to each other, then it's perfectly possible to fall in love with them. I've read love letters people have written in the 18th and 19th centuries to people they've never physically met, so I know it's possible. It's the inner personality - the 'soul' - that you fall in love with - not the face.

another one of those very organised guys who is in control of every facet of his life, except where his schwang leads him. OK, i confess, i used to be that way, too, and i used to like the mystery.

i met my wife in a street market in a back country podunk china city that a few foreigners travel through by bus or train, but very few ever get lost in. she thought i was one of the very few. being an english speaking tour guide (when she was not busy managing the shop she had in the streetmarket) she knew there would be a reward for the finding of a lost tourist. i was sad to dissappoint her.

some short conversation later i had arranged a dinner date with one of the few fluent english speakers in all of luoyang (6 million people), where i had been living and working for 9 months. some months later, over a candlelit pizza in a storefront window "show restaraunt" (you gotta live in china to understand this), i looked into her eyes and said to myself, "holy hell. this is a woman. what do i do next?"

yeah, it just kinda hit me when i least expected it, like good apple wine after about two weeks fermentation. the kind of sweet cider wine you drink all day and think nothing of. then, when you try to stand up, you fall flat on your face. realising that Li was a smoking hot young woman i respected and admired left me with just about as many choices as those 2 gallons of apple wine. i was just going to have to be still and enjoy the next few hours. i've been drinking ever since.

still, i thought long and hard about marrying her. i weighed the issue for a year, and measured us both against the challenges it presented. in the end, i decided it would be worth the risk, and have been kicking myself for the delay ever since.

Edited October 18, 2009 by justashooter