Vince Taylor and Rebekah Gordon moved slowly and deliberately from friendship to romance.
Self-study activity:
Watch the video and answer the questions below about it.
The activity is suitable for intermediate 2 students.
1 What does Rebekah mean by 'baggage'?
2 In what ecological disaster did Rebekah and Vince meet?
3 What was Rebekah first impression of Vince?
4 What unexpected thing did Vince do?
5 How does Vince describe the divorce process?
6 What does 'the third person in the relationship' refer to?
People have baggage, people have past relationships, people have children, people have all these things that make them complicated (1), but at the same time those things that are complicated are what makes people real and I think it’s, you know, what has made our love and our relationship real is that it isn’t some picture perfect little story book.
We actually met during the heart of the Deepwater Horizon oil spill (2) back in 2010.
I’m a coast guard officer.
And I was providing legislated affairs support to the coast guard. We basically spent two very long days preparing his cleaning officer to testify at this hearing. I remember thinking , god you know this guy is really, is very handsome, you know but I saw his wedding band and so it was kind of, oh, well, I guess we’ll just focus on the work and that will be that (3) . We kind of kept the correspondence over email and also instant messaging and, you know, and er really kind of enjoyed each other’s friendship.
What he did which was completely unexpected was that he brought me a birthday present (4). A sign that he had made, out of wood, of the Giant’s logo.
I was trying to do something that was just for me a very simple way of expressing a feeling that I didn’t have the ability to say at the time.
I think that was the night when we acknowledged that we had feelings for one another.
I just said you know, very honestly, you know, I’m crazy about you and that’s very, very hard for me to reconcile, you know, being married, you know, and she began to cry. I want to console her but I know there is this, you know, invisible boundary that, you know, that I’m not going to cross.
You know, love is one those things where it doesn’t always happen the way that you think that it’s supposed to happen. It was tough trying to figure out what the right way forward was.
Going through the divorce process was incredibly difficult (5). There would be days where I don’t even know if I could have got out of bed if it weren’t for Rebecca.
It was something that was too important and too meaningful to give up on uhh… or to not see through.
Hold on one second. You’re okay? You need help?
You need help? Okay.
Does he need help?
Yeah… Sorry.
Sorry.
At times you describe this as having, you know, like a, like a third person in the relationship.
And you know, that third person is, you know, Vince’s kids and his marriage (6) and through, you know, dealing with the pieces of that are still with us, and will be with us. You know, there’s a lot of, about, you know, just not giving up, you know, this is worth fighting for, you know your kids are worth fighting for, you know, being able to move forward as a family unit it’s worth fighting for.
