Dating and Falling in Love | Page 5

beautiful unconditional
love on your part. And how you handled that
still remains with deep appreciation in my
heart.

SCOTT: One of the things we did that made it
so enjoyable is that we were our own
entertainment company. We didn't spend a
lot of money going out on expensive dinners
and high end entertainment. I really
appreciated that. Again, we weren’t trying to
impress. We went to movies. We had
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fireplace talks. We had simple meals. We
took walks on the beach and in parks and
stayed in nature. We'd go for an outing to
have ice cream, and we’d laughed and
laughed and laughed. I loved our playfulness.

SHANNON: It’s true. You know, we did a
movie a week. That was our deal. And
remember running up and down the stairs in
Santa Monica in Los Angeles as we chased
each other towards the movie theatre?

SCOTT: We were chasing like little kids
playing.

SHANNON: We would park on the third or
fourth floor of this parking structure, and
then we'd have to walk down the stairs
because we didn't like the elevator. And we
started walking down the stairs and the next
thing I knew, I was running, and you were
chasing me. We did that every week to every
movie and coming back from every movie,
back to the parking lot.

SCOTT: Well, isn't it interesting looking back?
These were a thousand and one ways you
were saying to me, "I love you, Scott," even
though you weren't able to think or even say
those words. We were having love.

SHANNON: There was so much laughter and
love and giving and sharing at such light and
deep levels, that when we look back on our
dear courtship, it's the happiest memories.
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We’ve laughed and shared the happiness over
and over again.

SCOTT: I know, we did silly things too. I
remember pulling up in front of your house
for a date, and I had told my secretary to call
you. I called on the car phone and sent a fax
to you, and I could see you through the
window going to the fax machine, that said,
"Hi, someone who loves you is at the front
door."

SHANNON: I couldn't believe it. It was so
cute! I read the fax and ran to the door. And
there you were!

SCOTT: One of the things that makes love
work at this stage of dating and falling in love
and in relishing the courtship is that there
was no inconsistency in our love. There was a
constant flow of harmony and love. It was
always sweet. And we were really getting to
know each other in this constant ocean of
love.

SHANNON: Neither one of us had mood
swings. That had been a problem in a
previous relationship. I was relieved that
that never even came up in our relationship.
We protected our garden and allowed our
relationship to bloom and grow in a natural,
healthy way.

SCOTT: Today we're so happily married, and
when we look back to our period of dating, it
was just such a wonderful time. You deserve
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to look back on your love life and this dating
period as being ecstatic, just a lovely time.
So you don't try to force that to an early
conclusion. You try to let it be. Let it be all
that love wants it to be for you.

The fourth stage of dating and falling in love
is putting love on the line. We want to be
able to reveal our deepest self. Because
remember, we want to be loved for who we
truly are.

SHANNON: You know, we also want to be
able to reveal how we truly feel inside. People
hide their feelings.

SCOTT: If we play games now at the early
stage of dating, it'll probably go on forever.
We have to be willing to put our relationship
on the line with honesty. Shannon, I
remember you were still living in the house
that you and your former husband, even
though you're divorced, were living in. And it
was a pretty expansive home, 3,000 square
feet, with lots of fancy surroundings. And
early on in our dating I was thinking privately
to myself, “I can't support this lifestyle. This
is too much for me.” I remember having the
courage