Who knew it would turn out this way...
Between the time Stephen first introduced himself to me and when a mutual friend introduced us in January 2014, I traveled, spent time with friends, and worked to put my life back together so I would feel more stable when I decided to start dating again. I’m not going to go into detail about how it ended before because someone like that doesn’t deserve anymore airtime, but I will say that it could easily be made into a movie and I wouldn’t wish that experience on my
worst enemy.
I remember the day clearly. It was early January and I had just gotten back from a two week trip to Canada. It was a new year and I felt like I was finally ready. Luck would have it that my friend, Megan, had just met her boyfriend’s roommate. He had just finished working out and was eating dinner in the kitchen when she stopped by on her way out to meet me and
some of our other friends. She showed up to our friends’ happy hour a little late, came sauntering in, and said in her southern accent, “I just met my boyfriend’s roommate. He is cute and single. Stephanie, what are you doing on Friday night?”
I turned to my friend, Marisa, and said, “it’s the year of yes, right?” She shook her head, so I said I would go on a double date on
Friday night.
Now here is where the Law of Attraction is really funny. Now that I had said yes, I told Megan to tell me more about this guy other than he obviously works out. She said he was in the Coast Guard.
Let me take a step back. I had 5 specific no’s
on my dating list…
No military. My previous experience was terrible and I didn’t want to repeat it.
No guys from the northeast. That wasn’t a good experience before either.
Over 6 feet tall. I am 5’9″ and in all of my life, I had never dated anyone taller than me.
No guys with big Irish or Italian families. My ex constantly told me that I wasn’t good at family and that his family didn’t like me, so I wanted to avoid that scenario if at all possible.
And number 5 was that I couldn’t listen to another dude talk about his WOD, so absolutely no crossfitters.
You can see where this is going, right?
Back to the Coast
Guard. After hearing this, I turned to my other friend and asked her if she knew this roommate Coast Guard guy since her husband was in the Coast Guard. She immediately knew who he was, started showing me pictures of him at her house in Florida from several years before, and told me how much she and her husband both really liked him. That was enough for me to stick with my yes answer to the date.