Maria over at Just Eat Your Cupcake threw out the idea of posting about how we met the loves of our lives. I figured I’d partake since we all know how sappy I can be when it comes to S.

S and I didn’t meet in a traditional way; we weren’t introduced by friends and we didn’t bump into each other at the local independently run organic only coffee shop. We met online.

Not one for the bar scene, I was online quite often. I met a lot of women but few really stood out to me. Out of frustration, I tried sticking it out with a Vietnamese girl I’d met online. She was very sweet and she found me funny, we had fun together but I never felt that spark. The fact that her hair smelled like food didn’t exactly make me want to lean in to be close to her, either. After a few dates, I broke it off knowing I was wasting my time and hers.

I went back online but decided that I’d give it one more shot. If I met another flake or someone else who I had little chemistry with, I would quit the online thing and take some time on my own. And then I ran across a profile that caught my eye. “Wanna have a gay ol’ time?” it asked. That stood out to me as it sounded like something I would say.

The woman’s profile was short, to the point and honest. I noticed that she was ten years older than me but I figured I had nothing to lose, so I sent her a virtual smile.  (I should point out that neither one of us had our pictures on our profile.) Within minutes, she smiled back. Not wanting to lose any momentum, I e-mailed her through the site’s internal mail system.

I logged off to run some errands and was surprised to see a reply to my e-mail the next time I signed in. She liked my profile, she said she found it well written. We exchanged a few more e-mails before she suggested having an IM conversation.

We chatted for over two hours and I learned that a good friend of hers had deterred her from talking to me because of my age and my zodiac sign. I must have made an impression though because she disregarded her friend’s advice and continued to talk to me. At the end of our online chat, I suggested she call me the next day and gave her my phone number.

At 2 o’clock the next day, the time she said she would call, my phone rang. A bit anxious, I answered and was immediately taken with the voice on the other end of the phone. After the initial shyness, we chatted like we’d known each other for years.

We spent the next few days talking on the phone at night for hours. One night,  I decided to ask her for  out for a coffee. I threw out the suggestion and almost immediately recanted it, worried that I’d come on too strong, too soon. She let me know that she would indeed like to meet for a coffee.

The day we were to meet, I was excited, anxious and had a stomach full of butterflies. We had spent a week talking for hours late into the night. She was the highlight of my day. I couldn’t wait to get home from work so that I could call her to talk to her and hear her voice.

We agreed to meet at a subway station one Sunday afternoon. I made my way up the escalator excited as hell but afraid at the same time. I wasn’t worried that she’d kidnap me or kill me. I was worried that we’d meet in person and there wouldn’t be any chemistry. I liked talking to her so much and had felt we’d made a connection. I was terrified of being let down.

I looked around the subway station entrance and caught sight of her leaning against the glass by a set of doors, the sunlight enveloping her. I remember walking through the turnstyle and taking her in. She literally took my breath away. She was taller than me, straight blonde hair and was busying herself with her Blackberry.

“Reading anything good?” I asked as I approached.

“Nah,” she replied looking up at me, smiling. “Just playing poker.” Green eyes a different shade than mine framed by small brown glasses and a perfect smile made me weak in the knees.

We began our walk out of the subway station in search of where to go first. Things seemed a bit awkward, she wasn’t really looking at me and the conversation was a little fragmented. Was I not what she expected? Was I hideous? Was she embarrassed to be seen with me? I flashed back to a conversation we’d had where she told me about skipping out on a date by hailing a cab as soon as she could. I looked around, trying to see if any cabs were coming and trying to tell if she was trying to signal one.

We made our way around to some stores and just as I thought she was going to turn to me and say that she had to go, she suggested we go grab a bite to eat. Our first date ended up lasting five hours as we had some brunch and then went for drinks.

At the end of it, she hailed a cab and I stood where I was uncertain of what to do or say next. Most of the girls I’d met and dated hugged on the first date (although most kissed). When S got into her cab, she merely waved. Uncertain of what to make of it all, I walked to the subway station and made my way home.

I had a great time. She was smart, funny, had a great sense of humour, had a good job, her own place and knew what she wanted. I thought she’d had a good time too. She said she would call me but didn’t everyone say that?

A few hours after arriving home, my cell phone rang, and it was her, my S.

Related posts:

  1. Candlelit Dinner
  2. Lazy, Hazy Sunday Afternoon
  3. Crunchy Hair and Wrong Turns
  4. P-p-p-poker Face
  5. Waiting by the window
  6. Glamour & Leisure
  7. What a Week…
  8. “How serendipitous”
  9. The Sushi Rage
  10. Morning Rage, by S