And the days go by, like a strand in the wind

Dear Nick,

Seventeen years ago tonight I walked into the Tabard Inn on what would be my last first date. 

I love this date, and used to document it annually, but I've kind of fallen off on that. But I love the first year post.

We hadn't yet had kids, so I didn't yet know the phrase "warmy-coldy"—but warmy-coldy perfectly describes the November weather that evening. Which I wasn't dressed for when I left for work in the morning.

I'd have been on time if I hadn't gone home to change.

Well, I've contended that for years, but with my current understanding of my ADHD and my fraught relationship with time, and my jaded view of dating, I probably would've been slightly late anyway.

Back then, I didn't wear my glasses all the time, because I could see clearly at distance. And so if men hadn't treated me like I was smart when I wore my glasses, and not so smart when I didn't, I wouldn't have started wearing my glasses out at night.

And then after that one Match guy asked if I wore my glasses to look less pretty, I defiantly always wore them on dates.

But otherwise, I wouldn't have been wearing my glasses, so they wouldn't have fogged up when I arrived, slightly late and slightly blindly flustered, at the Tabard.

And you wouldn't have had something to tease me about immediately, and something to repeat very probably until death us do part when telling people about our first meeting.

Sometimes I think about the what-ifs, and so many of my what-ifs are wishing the past were different. My what-ifs are anxiety driven.

But recently I read this thing that said something like, "What if everything works out?" 

And sometimes, like 17 years ago tonight, when I wasn't exactly on time, but was barely late, and you were already sitting on a sofa drinking a beer—which, let's be honest, is not a hardship at the Tabard Inn—things do in fact work out.

Seventeen years ago tonight, we'd been working in offices about five blocks apart for a couple years, and yet we'd never bumped into each other in a coffee shop or lunch place, or on the street corner waiting for a light. 

In a movie, we'd have done one of those things.

But in real life, we were both on the Internet, and this night, November 13th, worked for both of us. And once my glasses cleared, I spotted you, and you stood up, and I put small hand into your big one, that was that.

And I've never looked back. 

Love,

Lisa