 In the middle of the year, my fiance made a decision to transfer to the University of Washington in Seattle because they had the best Far Eastern Languages and History Department on the west coast. But before he left, in December, an event happened that deeply traumatized us both. His younger brother, who was exactly my age to the month and who had been a very charismatic and popular athlete in high school, was suddenly killed in an auto accident. He was thrown from his car into a field, where he lay in the dark until he was brought to the local hospital where he died. It was my first experience with the death of someone I knew so well who was also a young person. The winter months became much darker and more depressing than they might have been, and I was further swayed toward the decision to marry at the end of that year. I also read a romantic novel at around that time, which told the story of a young couple who were not glamorous, who were just plain and ordinary, but who found a deep fulfilling love with each other. Since I saw myself as plain, I made myself believe that this marriage could work. It turned out as the years passed, that while I may have been plain, I was anything but ordinary.
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