How We Met

We met my during my last year of college.  I was super busy.  I had a huge schedule with a maximum load of school hours, worked full time slinging drinks at a bar until all hours of the night, and was also working with 11 other women to create a state-wide women's leadership conference.  I was really too busy to be involved with someone.  It was in that bar that I spotted Jeff one afternoon playing pool with my friend Lew.  They had just moved into town.  He was really handsome.  He was disheveled handsome.  He had on long jeans, a dirty shirt, and his hair was all a mess curling up around his big, blue eyes.  He was pretty.  And he was hot.  He turned heads.  Nothing major happened that day.  We just said hi.   And in fact, that day was so uneventful that he doesn't even remember meeting me so I obviously didn't make a significant impression on him.  

He actually has a totally different story.  He says we met at my house one night.  Maybe I just looked prettier that night than I did in my working-girl mode at that bar and that's when he actually saw me.  I lived with a couple of boys on Hawkins Street in Murfreesboro where there was never a dull moment.   We were having a party one evening celebrating nothing, I'm sure.  I remember walking through the kitchen towards the door that was opened up to the back yard.  I can still see it clearly.  There were several people sitting outside sort of circled around each other.  Jeff was sitting on the side of the circle that positioned him so I could see his face while walking towards the door.  He was just as stunning as before.  But this time, he saw me.  And I could feel him seeing me.   I'm sure I blushed as I went on about my way to enjoy the good times.  But I don't think he stopped watching me.  One of my roommate's girlfriends cornered me inside later and told me that Jeff thought I was beautiful.  So that did it.  I flirted.  With my eyes.  I don't think I really even talked to him too much.  But we both knew.  So the night ended and that was that.  Until he called.  He called!!!!  Well, he didn't really call me, but he called.   I had just gotten back from a camping trip and hadn't showered in 3 or 4 days and I was raaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaanky nasty.  He was calling the house to see if anyone wanted to go hang out for a bit . . .you know, like called to see if "the guys" wanted to hang out.  But they were gone!!!!  Yippy!  I don't know where they were, but they were gone and everyone else that Jeff knew was unavailable to hang out too, so out of sheer  boredom and the need to have a little conversation that Sunday afternoon, he gave in to his only available option:  Me!!!  I went to hang out all stinky and smelling like a campfire and with all sorts of leaves dangling from my wild hair.  I went as I was and he liked it.  Again it was playful and innocent and nothing major happened except that it set the stage for it to keep happening.  He would keep calling.  One night, he called to see if I was going to a friend's party and when I told him that I couldn't because I was studying until 11ish, he said that he'd leave the party and come get me then.  Thinking about it now, I see possible motivations on his part to come get me that I didn't see then and the waiting to get me is  probably not really that big of a deal.  But at the time, it just seemed so considerate.  It seemed so nice that at 6:00, he decided he would wait to see me so that I could study.  Most guys would have either tried to talk me out of staying in or found an alternative girl to spend the evening with.  But not him.  I was too busy.  And he waited.