Once Upon a Time...

... a girl went to a party.

It was the summer of '96. A group of freshly graduated friends gathered to celebrate our last summer together before scattering off to begin our lives as grown ups. It was a diverse mix of strangers and friends (mostly strangers to me, but everyone was a friend of someone there).

I met someone that evening.

One of the guys at the party caught my attention during a poorly played game of badminton when he decided to use the oh-so-suave-and-subtle (albeit, accidental) pick-up maneuver of running into me and knocking me into a post. Sigh. So dreamy... :)

He turned out to be a very nice guy and despite the unconventional "introduction" and the fact that he was incredibly shy, we somehow managed to start a relationship. My family loved him and for some strange reason, he got along with my pesky little brothers and parents. We were a wonderful match.

At the end of the summer, I moved away. I had always dreamed of going to Tennessee for college and was happy to discover that my dream was becoming a reality. But after a semester of long-distance, I made the terribly difficult decision to end the sweet summer romance. It broke my heart to break his heart, but it was what I felt I needed to do.

Fast forward to now (there's no need to relive my entire mess of dating mishaps again right now. We all know it's there):

Less than a month ago (August 22nd, to be exact), I declared myself free of the tragic heartbreak of the past. I realized that by developing a random crush on someone, I was finally ready to put in a real effort in the dating arena.

The next day I signed on to Facebook and discovered a private message waiting for me. It was one of those "hey, how you doing, it's been so long" messages from someone I had never expected to ever hear from again.

His name is Mike. He now lives in West Virginia. And in the course of 12 years, he managed to find it in him to forgive me for my decision.

We started writing on Facebook, then email, then eventually text. With 12 years worth of life to catch up on, there was so much to say to one another. Amazingly, he's still single, still sweet, and still a lot of fun to talk to. We have so much in common, most importantly our sense of humor. His messages always crack me up and to be honest, I look forward to my phone giving the familiar ding of an incoming text.

This past weekend, Mike came back into town. His family still lives here and he had already been planning a trip out to visit them. Since he would be in town, we decided to meet up and catch up face to face.

He arrived on Thursday, but we didn't have plans until Friday. After work Friday evening, I ran home and took my time getting ready (okay, I'll be perfectly honest, I left work early so that I would have a decent amount of time to prepare myself). I had mentally went through my closet several times in the week preceeding, and had switched my outfit a dozen times in my head while at work that day. I finally settled on a sundress and sandals (casual, but pretty; comfy considering the temprature decided to head back into the 90's for the weekend; stylish as always). He showed up about a quarter after six. I was outside watching Jade play with the neighbor boys. Surprisingly, she didn't bark at him when he showed up.

He's tall. Even in my heels, I only clear his shoulders. He's just as good looking as I remembered him being, more mature looking with the facial hair (and normally I hate that stuff!)

We went out to dinner and stayed at the restaurant for several hours, just talking and laughing and catching up. Then he came over to my place and we watched The Princess Bride. Not only is it THE BEST date movie ever, but it's was also one of the few that we knew we both would enjoy. At dinner we discovered that we have very different tastes in movies (as in, every movie he mentioned I either said "I never heard of it" or "Yeah, there's a reason I haven't watched that one").

Saturday we did lunch and a movie at the theater (his choice this time).

Somewhere along the line on Saturday, we semi-discussed the "what next" of our situation. It's obvious that we both like each other very much, we still have so much in common and get along so well. But we'd be starting at the same place we left off, across the country from each other.

Enter Deema's brain. Time for the usual debate: yes or no? heart or head? take a chance or proceed with caution?

Well, what would you do?

We're both a bit of the romantic type. We decided that thanks to the progress of technology, the availability of "vacation time" and airplanes, and our life experiences as much behind us as still before us, that we might be a bit more prepared for the trials that distance will hand us.

In other words, we decided to give ourselves a second chance.

I'm really excited and happy to have him back in my life. He's incredibly smart (please don't ask me what he does because the best I can give you is "something with computers and the government". I really should pay closer attention when people talk about work....) and silly and even though I'm not supposed to admit it (often) extremely sweet. He even sent me flowers at work a few weeks ago. See, sweet!

Even though we don't watch the same type of movies, we do share the very mellow, relaxed nature that allows for compromise. I have no fear that he will punish my one girly movie by sitting me through three boy shows. We do have a similar taste in music, but I don't know most of the artists he listens to. Neither of us like country music (yay!!!).

He still gets along with my brothers (well, he got along with Derrick. I can only assume since he's so much like both of them that he will also get along with DJ still). Mom is happy because he likes dogs (she thinks there's something wrong with a guy who doesn't like dogs). And he's been dog AND cat approved. Not only did Esther allow him to pet her after she watched him play with Jade, but Jade PLAYED with him. And she didn't sit between us and growl at him (like she does with every other person I've tried to hang with).

Most importantly, he makes me feel special. It's been SO LONG since I've been really special.

It seems I've got my work cut out for me on the clothing front, though. It's a sign of how much I like him that I'm willing to just be content with being fashionable for the both of us.

But he does make me laugh, and isn't that what us girls are really looking for?