Welcome back, fearless readers! Not only am I, Chris Tulley, cool, but my wife is even cooler. Believe it! I have had the privilege of being married to Morgan Hepburn (she refuses to change her name) since the middle of 2016, and that has kickstarted the greatest adventure of my life. She is the Serena Van Der Woodson to my Dan Humphrey, the Joe Biden to my Barack Obama. So for this Valentine’s Day, I’d like to share some of the reasons why I’m so infatuated with this creature of mine.

Morgatron could not have come into my life at a better time than when she did. It was late winter of 2014 and I was a wreck. Several months prior, I had gone through a pretty rough breakup. I was still recuperating  when Morgan and I met. I had developed a drinking problem, a hatred of school problem (it was my Junior year of college) and a self-deprecation problem. Then Morgan came out of left field  and changed all that. Now I love drinking, learning and myself.

El Morgo and I are both the kind of people who thrive when we go against the grain when we can. We are paving our own path through this world, in hopes that our friends and family follow. While I apparently ran into her at a chili cook off earlier in the year, the way we really met accentuates how lame I was (I swear I’m not anymore). In lieu of making real friends, I was thirsty for Twitter followers at this time, so I was just drunkenly following random cute girls at Grace College. Morgan happened to be one them, and a few days later had tweeted Avett Brothers lyrics. I, being an avid Avett fan, replied with the rest of the lyrics, and now we’re sleeping together.

Okay, I skipped a couple of minor details in there, but here’s what really matters, our first date. This whole Twitter  fiasco occurred over Spring Break, when I was in Warsaw and Morgan was at her parents house. We started Facebook chatting then texting a few days after the Avett event, and had decided when she returned from holiday we would officially meet. So being the over-anxious person I am, I began to prep.

When she did finally come back (I faintly remember thinking that Spring Break lasted eight weeks that year), we went out for a romantic dinner at the local Wendy’s. We weren’t calling it a date at that time, but it was. So here’s how it went down. Before we ate our Baconators and dank chickie nugs in perpetual giggles, I had prepared for the awkward goodbye. The first goodbye of the first date is always weird, what with the lack of kisses and Grace-appropriate side hugs. So when it was time to drop her off at the doors of her dorm, I was ready.

Before she got out of my truck, I motioned for her to pause. I then reached to my backseat and retrieved the confetti cake with pink frosting I had lovingly baked the morning prior. She looked at the cake, then looked at me with a scared, confused face I now see almost everyday right before I do something awesome. I then uttered the greatest, most thought out sentence of my life that pretty much cemented our relationship. “I baked you this cake, so that nothing else will ever be as awkward as this moment.” And it hasn’t.

I love Morgan for a multitude of reasons that I pray she knows, but there’s one that trumps the rest. The reason why she’s the one person for me. More important than her love for our daughter (cat) Blake, her desire to make the world a better place by caring for those who can’t do it themselves, and passion for expanding her world view. 

Morgan puts up my bullshit antics. I can obsess over celebrities (Tom Hardy, Blake Lively and Goku), and it’s okay. It’s more than okay; she loves when I get excited about nerdy shit.

She will sit and listen as I cry over my love for X-Men comics. She gets cute and dolled up when I introduce her to new friends. The Morgato doesn’t mind that I have to go to the bathroom all the time, am in love with her friends (call me sometime, Morgan B) and have to have daily discussions with my dad.

I can clearly see this in my own life, but I also see it in others’. My wife has the auspicious skill of making people other than herself feel important, validated and loved. She cries when she sees photos of our siblings, nephews and nieces. She tells me when she’s interested in something and enlightens me when I should be interested as well. She listens to my mad man ramblings almost daily. She is a selfless, conscientious person who rarely takes steps backwards. She loves to work, learn and grow. She loves even more to stay in bed and snuggle, ignoring all the garbage outside of our house.

I earnestly hope that I impact her world as much as she has mine, but I cannot fathom that being true. Morgan kicks our cat off the bed, eats more chicken wings than I can, and leaves dirty dishes out for days at a time, and I could not be more in love. I believe in a little bit of fate, and that fate holds us together. So yeah, I pride myself on my individuality, but she puts me to shame. She is the reason I want to be a better person.

Morgan Kirby Hepburn (Yeah, that’s her name), I love you more than Chuck loves Blair. Here’s to the first of many married Valentine’s Days.