I’ll Be Loving You (Forever)

The love stories of four East Dallas duos

Chuck and Sonia

It was the spring of 1997 and Chuck Kobdish was 28 years old. His friends were house sitting for a property on White Rock Lake and decided to throw a crawfish party.

“I was tired, had no interest in going,” he says.

The initial plan was to stay home until suddenly, something “sparked” in him. It was late when he finally made his way to the house and made himself comfortable by the pool.

Sonia was 29 at the time and also decided to make an appearance at the party. Chuck and Sonia had several mutual friends. In fact, his best friends in college were her best friends in high school. Small world.

Chuck noticed her among all the mixing and mingling and began to make his way towards her. He was loitering a bit, trying to “do some recon.” Eventually, she inturrupted his anxious loitering and said, “Don’t say hi.”

“Loved her ever since,” he says.

They dated for a year, were engaged for a year and have been married since 1999.

The couple now have two children, two rescue dogs and 25 years of marriage in East Dallas.

Kristine and Jimmy

Kristine was working as a hairdresser and living in a duplex on Lower Greenville back in 1995. The St. Patrick’s block party was fast approaching ­— back then it was south of Mockingbird. She wasn’t too keen on attending the party herself but she couldn’t help but hear the ruckus from her apartment.

She threw on a green dress and decided she would at least go grab a drink. Jimmy’s friends – before his arrival – were watching the festivities from a platform on the bed of a truck. Kristine was mingling with them when Jimmy pulled up in a purple Harley-Davidson motorcycle. The look was complete with a pomeranian named Max riding on the seat with him.

“I was smitten,” she says.

The rest of the night she was trying to stick around long enough to strike up conversation with the purple Harley rider. Her friends didn’t know his name and even after petting Max, she just couldn’t get much out of him. The group went out to Deep Ellum, and while the two were watching the live band perform, Jimmy turned to her and asked if she liked another guy in the group. The question was jaw-dropping considering the calculated effort she had put in the entire night to speak to him.

“No! I like YOU!” she replied. “Why do you think I’m here?”

“We had our first kiss in the front window of Club Dada that night, and the rest, as they say, is history,” she says.

Kim and Dennis

Kim followed her parents to Dallas in December of 1994 after graduating from Florida State University.

One day, the 22-year-old walked into Cantina Laredo’s crowded bar with her parents. She immediately locked eyes with Dennis as “time stopped.”

Dennis was 30 years old and getting his appraising license, working part-time as a bartender to make extra money.

“He was so busy that night and I didn’t want to be obvious that I thought he was cute,” she says. “So, I left without introducing myself.”

Dennis was 30 years old and getting his appraising license, working part-time as a bartender to make extra money.

“He was so busy that night and I didn’t want to be obvious that I thought he was cute,” she says. “So, I left without introducing myself.”

The idea of seeing him again was already nagging at her. She told her parents she had to go back. She had to meet the handsome bartender.

Little did she know, the handsome bartender felt the same way. He turned to his coworkers and said, “If that redhead ever walks in here again, give her my number.” He even called his sister and proclaimed he had just seen the woman he was going to marry.

A week later, she went back to the bar and he asked her on a date to an Irish Festival.

Kim says the two quickly became inseparable. The couple has lived in Forest Hills for the past 25 years and have three children.

“Even after 30 years, Dennis never fails to express his love, and admiration for me daily and we are very much in love,” Kim says.

Betsy and Brian

Betsy and Brian met in eighth grade. The two were in Sunday school at St. Thomas Aquinas. The East Dallas natives both went to Woodrow Wilson, sharing the same friend groups and growing up together. They shared a friend group and grew up together. Betsy would like Brian, and Brian would like Betsy ­— just not at the same time. When one was single, the other was taken.

“It was never timed right,” Betsy says.

Until, it was. The summer before their junior year of college – eight years after the two originally met – Betsy says “the timing was finally right.”

The couple has now been married for 20 years and have three children, following in their parents’ footsteps by attending neighborhood schools. Their oldest is now a sophomore at Woodrow, and their youngest two are in kindergarten and fourth grade at Lakewood Elementary. The Woodrow pride runs strong in the family, as Brian is also the cofounder of WoodrowFest.