I met Mark while I was first Halberdier Mom...David Springhorn explained who he was and that we'd be doing street gigs with him. And a couple of weeks later David asked me whether I'd like to go with him and his then girlfriend to attend dinner out at Camporee at Mark's campsite :-). At the time, I was "Faire employment curious", as in I wanted to understand how you got to live week-wide in your camper out at Camporee ... so I said yes. When we got there, his campsite was wonderful. He had created a little "yard" out of rope and blankets, with a wooden cable-spool "table" and chairs and fairy lights as I remember to light the area at night. We arrived late afternoon (roughly Golden Hour) so everything was glowing in magical golden light. He'd cooked something yummy, but the best part as always was listening to him tell stories. The story that night was a true life romance...how he'd met the Love of his Life and how he was waiting for her. It could have been titled "Waiting For Colleen". He told us of seeing her walking (he on the low road, she on the high road) and instantly knew he'd seen THE WOMAN of his life. He had plotted to meet her, and in short order presented himself as an Incurable Romantic who had been looking for her all his life. Was she by any chance just waiting for him to come along? If so here he was! But of course it wasn't that easy. She was already engaged to be married to somebody else. In his telling of the story, he said he told her he was certain she was his woman, and he would wait patiently for her to come around to this opinion. She decided that although he was clearly charming and handsome she was going to stay the course and go through with the planned wedding. In my mind at this point he would have said something like "As you wish", but I'm pretty sure he didn't actually say that in the storytelling...and anyway the Princess Bride wasn't a movie yet. Anyway, Colleen did get married and was happy for awhile but fairly quickly that happiness evaporated and she found her marriage breaking up. She contacted Mark and said (as I remember), "I'm free now, but I'm not ready to date you or anybody. Now I need a year to get my head clear." And again I imagine him saying "As you wish", but I believe what he actually said in the storytelling was "I'm yours when you want me." It was at nearly the end of the year when we had dinner at his campsite, and he was fairly glowing with hope and anticipation. He felt sure his waiting was nearly over and soon he would finally make his dream a reality. His enthusiasm was infectious and I remember him glowing in that afternoon light, so happy and certain in his absolute love of the lovely Colleen.