Ten years ago, on May 31st I met Jeff. It was a Saturday that made me feel like staying inside. All cocooned on the couch with a book and a blanket and the cat. As the day progressed I got to feeling more and more like skipping the dinner I had scheduled that night. Yet, something propelled me out of my lethargy and I got up off the couch and got dressed to go out. I drove into DC and the skies opened up. You know the kind of rain that reminds you that you should have just stayed home? Yup. A rain storm that drizzles, then pours, then drizzles, then pours. Great. To top it off, I got lost. I blame it on the rain. But really, I didn't go into Georgetown all that often and sure enough I got lost. I almost bagged the evening. It felt like the fates were telling me something and that something was to stay on my couch. However, I pulled over and pulled out my map of DC and found where I needed to go.
I still managed to be one of the first to arrive at the dinner at the Sea Catch in Georgetown. Jeff arrived shortly after. We were in a group of 8 people, strangers really, who had signed up to "meet up" for dinner. The group is called Dinner At 8 and I'd been doing it for about a year. That and Single Volunteers. Something to get out of the house and meet people. I remember talking to Jeff at the bar over a drink but not much else. I do remember that he made sure to sit next to me at the dinner table and that we talked a great deal. I knew he went to school in Florida, that he had seen several space shuttle launches and that he owned his own company. Other than that, I can't tell you what we talked about.
But I had a good feeling. I gave him my email address and as I drove home I remember thinking that "I'd just met the man I would marry." Corny, but true.
Monday morning I had an email from Jeff asking me out for the next weekend and giving me his phone number.
Our first phone call was awkward. I thought it was just me, but as I learned later on -- Jeff was really just hard to understand on his cell phone. If you never called him on it, you wouldn't understand. He was perfectly auditory in person, but something happened on the phone and he was near impossible to understand. Years later, even after I had become an expert in Jeff-phone-speak, there would still be times he'd get frustrated because I had no clue what he was trying to tell me.
We set a date for the following Saturday - and that is an even better story...
I can't tell you much of what we talked about and I couldn't even really recall what Jeff looked like after a few hours at dinner. But I remember the feeling. The feeling that I almost missed something special... if I'd stayed home.
Sincerely,
Jeff's Wife
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