May, 1986. I was out with one of her friends on a double date. The girl seemed to have a bit of a silly side that didn't impress me very much.

We had stopped by this friends of her's house and my eyes met the eyes of this gorgeous 23yo brunette.

There was this kind of awkward silence for a minute or two. There was something there that never in my 20 years had I ever seen or felt before. It was an immediate connection. Call it love at first sight if you want to, but I was immediately smitten. As stupid as I know I had to appear to her, she had her eyes and smile fixed on mine too. That lasted for several seconds.

We were at her house for about 5 minutes without either of us saying a word to each other. Somehow before we left again I mustered up enough courage to speak. As the others were walking out the door, I knew it was now or never to say something clever. In my best trying to be cool voice I said, "I'll be back". She just smiled, but in my mind I was thinking, "Damnit, did I just say that? What a boneheaded moron %&*@# %&*@#".

Fast forward about two hours. We had been in my 68 mustang and now I had dropped everyone off. I was riding the roads thinking about Gorgeous. Very uncharacteristic of me, I took a chance and went back to her house. I was always more shy and reserved than that. The lights were on and I once again mustered up some courage and stopped. She was all grins when she came to the door and actually invited me in. We talked and laughed the rest of the night and I headed home just in time to get ready to go to work.

We started dating and married before the year was up. I believe we have a very happy marriage and plan to uphold "until death do us part".