Austin Storm

Laura is my world. She agreed to marry me in 2009, and nothing has been the same since.

Before we were together, I admired how outgoing she was. She was always going to parties, and I stayed away from most social gatherings. In the security of marriage, our personalities kinda flipped. She suddenly wanted to stay in and I realized I’m energized by social gatherings.

Laura enables and inspires everything I’ve made. I had a very clear idea when starting the store that I was doing it for her. Not so much to make a living (though I’m rather grateful it does), but as a gift for her. And even though getting it running was grueling, she never questioned me staking the life we’d built – our small savings, our time and our future – on it.

She’s very clever. I am surprised and somewhat grateful that I’m not on the receiving end of her wit more often. She is also astonishingly beautiful, and her wit and beauty are together in my mind in a way that I don’t understand. I was reading a Facebook status update where she was complaining about bad drivers, and it made me laugh out loud because I could hear her saying it in my head and she looked beautiful.

Laura’s usually one step ahead of me, especially in our relationship. I know she’s crazy about me, but sometimes my love for her catches me by surprise, and I wonder over it out loud: “You know, I’m crazy about you.” “I know,” she says.