It's an inside job! (Part 1)

This story is a recent favorite. When I say recent, I mean in the past 5 years. LOL. For the record, this one shocked even me.

Years ago, around the holidays, I was at a friend’s house for a party. I see a guy who I have known for about 15 years. I met him through my friend as they are very close.

He is a fun-loving, very successful city guy but, we had lost touch over the years. Since we were the only single people at the party, we sat on the couch and got caught up.

I knew he was married years ago but he told me he is divorced with no kids. He told me his current situation is that he is dating a girl he met at a Cubs game, and overall having a great time.

He couldn’t believe I was still single. If I had a dime…….

Anyway, he has been to my condo before (years ago) so he told me that his favorite restaurant is across the street from me. He asked me if I would meet him after work sometime for a drink. Have we met? Of course!

I told him let’s wait until the holidays are over and I would be happy to join. Before we left, we exchange all of the necessary digits.

Sure enough, he reaches out to me and we plan a night to go to this fancy steak house. It is a Thursday night, and my expectation was this is just dinner with a friend.

As soon as we sit down, he introduces me to our server. He said, this is Sue, and this is our first date. Wait, what? I said, it is? He said, yes! I said, I thought you were dating someone from the Cubs game? He said, we broke up right after the holidays.

The server looks at us and says, well this is awkward. You think? Hilarious!

After I recovered from that initial shock, we continued to get caught up on life. I did ask him what happened with the Cubs girl and he said it fizzled. He told me that they had very different schedules and when she stayed over, he would come home to dishes in the sink from her making her own breakfast.

This selfishness of that gesture was the icing on the cake for him to get out. I can understand but I was nervously wondering if there were dishes in my sink at that very moment? LOL

He is very easy to talk to with no first date jitters because I didn’t even know it was a date! Anyway, during our conversation he told me he has spent half of his life trying to make girls happy and it wasn’t working.

I said, what are you doing that for? Being happy is an inside job. That is not anything you can fix.

He went on to say. I know, I have finally learned that, and you are the happiest person I know. And I want you to know, I find that incredibly attractive.

Let’s pause to think about that and collectively say “Awwwww”. I was taken aback from that comment because it might be the biggest compliment I have ever received. I said, wow, thank you.

So, we continue to have dinner and the bill comes. I fully expected to split it, but he took the bill and just slid it over next to his side of the table. A boss move that I always love that takes the awkwardness out of the bill.

I did ask, can I help you with that bill? Again, I was thinking we would go halfsies. He said, there is only one thing you can do to help me Sue. I said, what’s that? He said, go out with me again.

Let’s take a moment on that too. Awwwwww…I said, well sure, that is easy! Yes!

And, whew, because that bill was easily $300.00. HA!

I bet you are thinking, what could go wrong, right? Me too. Stay tuned for part 2 of this 3 part story!

Lesson learned? I am always the last to know if someone likes me. I need to do a better job of learning the clues as I never saw this coming! And, happiness is a choice that I try to choose every day...