Marnie's version of events:

I absolutely love the internet! We started this blog as a way to keep in touch with family, friends and curious acquaintances while John and I start a new adventure...not sure what it will morph into later.

Where to begin? Our story started at Select Comfort headquarters in Minneapolis in December, 2002. John had just transferred to Minneapolis from Atlanta. Kit and John's three children, Kaitlin, Taylor and Chandler, had moved back to Lovington, New Mexico. I had just started working at Select Comfort after a one year sabbatical. Jeff and I had been married 16 months (after a long courtship) and my children, Sean and Monica, were 13 and 15 at the time. Two weeks later (on New Years Eve Day), Jeff died of a heart attack in his sleep. He was only 44 years old. At that time, John (then known to me as just "Stange") and I had only known each other for 2 weeks as coworkers. He drove back from Chicago to attend the funeral. I was in a stupor at the time (thank God for my sister, Monica) but I do remember thinking that it was so kind of my new coworkers to come and also being slightly embarrassed. Not like my Musicland buds who were a great comfort and they already knew me so well, it didn’t matter I was catatonic. Family, as always, was a God-send particularly my sister. My mom, Judie, channeled from heaven.

I went back to work in an effort to muddle my way through the grief. Each night, I sobbed on the drive home. Sometimes, I had to park the car in the cul-de-sac to finish crying before I went home to the kids. John became a work friend and most importantly, he wasn't afraid to talk to me about Jeff. I don't mean to jump over this part of my story nor negate the tremendous difficulty this chapter entailed. However, I also don't want to wallow in it - Jeff taught me a lot about life, love and living. His legacy encompasses so much: always be kind, pay it forward with random acts of kindness, savor the moment, do your best every time, count your blessings, love deeply and be loyal (and my personal favorite: keep your tools clean and put them away after you use them). In any event, while this was the most difficult time of my life, it was also one of great personal growth. I am forever grateful to all of the caring people in my life, professional counseling and grief support groups.

Months went by and then years. My friendship with John grew. Slowly, my heart accepted that Jeff was gone forever. I remember a cathartic conversation with John about "missing" Jeff. I tried to describe that my thoughts of Jeff now were all about the times we had together and how lucky I was to have those memories rather than waking up each day and missing him all over again. Another legacy: Jeff (and my sister, Monica) taught me not to dwell on things I cannot control. Around this same time, I told John of my plan to get two dogs to keep me company in my old age in my soon-to-be empty nest. Before the puppy plan, I had been sending John 'signals' (you know what I mean) and each time he had politely shut me down. I assumed he was not interested and moved on to the puppy plan.

More months passed. Donna (most wonderful friend in the universe) and I drove to South Dakota to pick up the puppies. Olive and Sweet Pea came home and life went on. Sean and Monica were busy with their lives and the pups and I settled into our routine. Daylight savings time resulted in dark drives home from work each night (occasional tears now) and a dark, quiet house in the evenings. I started to think it would be nice to have someone to go to movies with or talk to about my day. One particular evening I had the bright idea of posting my profile on match.com. I quickly called my sister in Florida (should have called her first) and confessed. She immediately offered great editing advice and support. Within 24 hours, I pulled the profile. The responses (number and type) were almost frightening. I did correspond with 3 matches and eventually met 2 of them in person.

I confided in John at work about the match.com thing. He invited me to lunch (as a habit, I never went to lunch). He hinted that he would be open to doing things socially after work (still very subtle, I might add). I invited him to go with me to the wedding of a dear Diva friend on New Years Eve. John said "Oh, I have plans with a friend that night, but let me check to see if I can rearrange." Of course, I am thinking "Yikes, he was just being nice and now you've made him uncomfortable by putting him in a corner. Way to go." That afternoon, Stange came to my desk and said that he could go the wedding with me. I still wasn't sure that he was romantically interested in me until the stroke of midnight (stroke of genius for a first date!) when we kissed. This event is often referred to by the Divas as "The Kiss". The rest, as they say, is history.....

To say that John and I are on the same wave length would be the understatement of the year. Terms like soul-mates seem so overused. I am not sure how to describe our relationship without sounding trite. A few examples may shed some light: Quirky: John and I discovered that we use the exact same secret PIN number for everything. We both established that PIN number somewhere in the 1980s. Life focus: We both put our children first and foremost in our priorities and have similar loves of nature, photography and art of every medium. Most importantly, we love each other unconditionally. We are partners in life, love and spirit. We are each other's best friend. Our pasts have taught us to celebrate our feelings for each other and count our blessings hourly. Some people never find the love of their life, but I have been blessed twice. It brings me back to a wedding toast Jeff's dad made to us in which he honored the loves of his life. When Bob so poetically toasted LaVerne (Jeff's late mother) and Lonne (Bob's wife), I was not yet aware of the foreshadowing of his sentiments. We all knew that Bob and Laverne were madly in love every day until the day she died. We also knew that Bob's love for Lonne was a once-in-a-lifetime love affair and that these two relationships were a form of ying and yang in Bob’s heart. I could not have known at the time that Jeff was my ying and John would be my yang. I know it now.

Back to the factual details of the story. John and I planned and dreamed of our future as we continued to go to work each day at Select Comfort. We agreed that we wanted to do something with passion and it would involve art in the future. On a more concrete level, we also knew that we wanted to establish a home base closer to John's children (while maintaining a home base close to my children). We came up with a 5 year plan to buy a home in Texas and start a new business. John and I were sitting on our adjustable Sleep Number Bed with the laptop early in March, 2007 when I decided to surf the internet to find out what the real estate market in Texas looked like (translation: don’t go to the pet store unless you are prepared to come home with a pet). I had never been to Texas. John had lived in Texas during his Best Buy days with his family and knew the area. He told me to google the Hill Country area since we both agreed that water is a must in our lives (Aquarius and Pisces). I used the Google Earth map to zoom in on Lake Buchanan. Then, I googled real estate listings around the lake and up popped a listing for a log home in Tow, Texas (which we thought was pronounced "toe"). We googled Tow and learned a lot, including the correct pronunciation (rhymes with "now"). Hmmmm……Beautiful fishing lake, small rural town in the Hill Country, nearby golf, 5 hours from Lovington...
John flew to Austin on business 3 days later and drove to the Hill Country to look at the house. He also met our first new friend, Jeanette Martin (also known as a great realtor). We bought the house immediately (note the recurring theme of "No Dust on Us"). I booked week-end trips from Minneapolis using frequent flyer miles and we started to set up house in Tow to use once a month while our 5 year plan played out.

Tow is everything we were looking for and so much more. The log house is comfortable and cozy with a killer view of the lake. We are out in the booonies and loving it. That aside, we have met such great people here. Our neighbors are awesome. They have made us feel welcome. In the real world, life at Select Comfort was changing. The atmosphere and management style made it no longer enjoyable to go to work. On the other hand, John and I both loved our actual jobs and working with each other on a daily basis. We also enjoyed working with our friends Tom, Erin, Katherine, Meaghan, Julie, Diane, Karen, Jim, Jim, Kelie, Barb, Jerry, Bruce, Mike, Alix, etc. (As for some of our other coworkers and supervisors not named above: not so much). Dinner conversations about work reflected our frustrations. At times, John would put a moratorium on the subject to regain our life balance. The 5 year plan started to change into a 3 year plan...and then we wondered out loud if we would still be working at Select Comfort when they moved into the new headquarters in November, 2007.

Fate stepped in when Select Comfort decided to invoke a nepotism policy (2 years after John and I had started living together). Suddenly, our relationship caused a potential conflict of interest (we have a different theory, but we have let that one go). In a surprise meeting in August, I was told that Select Comfort and I would have to part ways.

OK - this is where "No Dust on Us" turns into what my sister refers to as "Hurling through Space". We knew the 3 or 5 year plan could stay in place if we both got new "day jobs" OR we could choose to follow our bliss now. As John continued to go to work at Select Comfort and I negotiated a severance package, I also incorporated in Texas as "Follow Your Bliss LLC". On a warm Saturday in early September, we were floating in Lake Buchanan on air mattresses when we decided upon the trade name "Patina" for our new retail business (home décor, women’s fashions, art, gifts). A few weeks later, Amy Shalles designed our beautiful logo. After much real estate scouting (hard to believe given our backgrounds right?), we found the perfect spot to open a retail store in Marble Falls, Texas. Once again, new friends Jim and Susie (also known as landlords), Scott, Anthony and Rob entered the picture.

That brings you up to the day this blog was started - November 14, 2007. We have shut the cabin down in Birchwood (drained the hot tub and put antifreeze in the toilet) and sadly waved good-bye. Not sure when we will get back there ourselves, but insist that family and friends use and enjoy the cabin even though we aren't there. Olive and Sweet Pea have been adopted by Scott and Kris Johnson and continue to live in Edina. We cancelled cable and turned the heat down on the house in Minnesota. That wonderful home sheltered Sean, Monica and I through my single mother days, the kids' growing up and the ups and downs of the past 19 years. John and I made it our home with artistic flavor and displays of our photography (as well as the very large TV for viewing Chicago Bears football games). We will return to celebrate Christmas in that house in a few weeks with extended family. Sean has indicated that he wants to live there for the rest of his life. Who knows?

John and I are back in Tow. We drove the Escalade down last week and towed our new trailer full of treasures from Wisconsin furniture-makers Ken Wilson and Ray Bock. Demolition on the store started yesterday and we plan to open the first week in March. It is 80 degrees and sunny in the Hill Country and life is good.