On the day of the St. Patrick's Day Parade here in Seattle, I celebrated after the Parade at Kell's with a Guinness, and had a friend take a picture of me. That picture soon ended up as my new facebook profile picture. If you haven't seen it, here it is:
On March 24th, my friend Bekki left a comment on the picture. The next day, I got a facebook message from this guy named Joe. This is what the message said:
Lisa,
I saw your funny St. Patrick's Day photo based on Bekki Miske's comment. Its kind of funny that we actually don't know each other because we have a few friends in common that are pretty close to me, including my sister and my ex-roommate (Bobby). I hope you are doing well and you have a great day today. I'm a huge fan of any woman that likes to drink Guiness, so let me know the next time you are in town and you've got a round on me!
Take care,
Joe
Apparently Bekki's comment had caused the photo and her comment to pop up in Joe's facebook news feed. He saw the picture and thought to himself, "Hey, a cute blonde girl that likes Guinness--this looks like my kind of woman!" (or something to that effect) and clicked on my profile. Upon discovering that I was a Double Domer, had been in his sister's law school class, and that we shared some mutual friends, he sent me that message. After receiving it, I checked out his profile, and decided to write back, asking him a few questions about himself. We exchanged "getting to know you" messages on facebook for about a month. Then, in one message, he said he was looking forward to meeting me after our exchanges. I was a bit taken aback by him mentioning this so soon, but since he went on to ask which football games I might be going to this year, I thought to myself, "Ok, I could just meet this guy over a beer at a tailgate. No big deal." The messages continued here and there, but with no definite plans for us to ever meet.
Meanwhile, unbeknownst to Joe, around mid-to-late April I had started talking with an ex of mine from ND about the possibility of us getting back together. Ironically, this guy is also named Joe, is also in the military (Navy), and also lived in Siegfried. (Amongst some of my close friends, the nicknames "Army Joe" and "Navy Joe" came to be used in this craziness.) I won't go into details about Navy Joe, but I will just give the essentials to the story: He's far away, we hadn't seen each other in over a year, and between the insanely high price of plane tickets and his insanely busy schedule, we weren't sure how we were going to see each other. Still, the idea of us getting back together seemed to have possibility, and we talked about it often.
On June 4th, Navy Joe was leaving to go to Europe for a week and a half. He called me from the airport to say goodbye, and told me that he would call me on June 16th, the day he got back. I was feeling all sad that morning, until I got an email from (Army) Joe. It was the first real email he'd sent me (we'd only sent facebook messages before), and it was very long. The one part that stood out for me, and that I kept reading over and over, was this:
...here is my offer to you: you can pick any one of the following options a-e that follow. Each option comes with a free round trip ticket. Don't worry about logistical issues, such as where while I stay and that sort of thing...those are easy details that can be worked out later. If you don't like options a-e, there is also option f...your call.
Option A - You can be my date to my former roommate's wedding in Atlanta in August (I think it is the weekend of Aug 9)
Option B - You can join me at one of the two ND games I plan on attending this year ND/Michigan in SB or ND/Army in NYC
Option C - If you really want, you can come visit me out at Ft. Leavenworth sometime over the next year
Option D - We can figure out a good weekend when you are free and I'll come out to Seattle to visit you
Option E - Something of your choosing along the same lines as A-D above
Option F - You can respectfully decline all of the above options and I won't ask again
(Those of you who know Joe will not be the least bit surprised at the way he laid this out.)
I was extremely impressed by his willingness to put himself out there like this. But at the same time, I felt terrible--this guy had no idea that I had something going on with someone else. I decided that I would tell him the truth, because I felt he deserved for me to be totally open and honest with him. So we exchanged phone numbers. The next day, Saturday, we talked for 2 1/2 hours. The same happened on Sunday, and it was during that conversation when he finally asked me if I'd picked an option. I told him that I honestly couldn't give him an answer right now, and then explained why. He took the news well, but said, "There are two things you should know: I don't take no for an answer, and I don't like to lose."
We kept talking, both via phone and online. The next weekend he took his laptop into his office so we could video chat, which we again ended up doing for about 2 1/2 hours each day Saturday and Sunday. He ended up switching to an unlimited texting plan because of me. I was very drawn to him, but there was always Navy Joe in the background. I waited for June 16th to come. It came and went with no phone call from Navy Joe. So did the 17th. So did the 18th. By that point, I was very strongly considering the idea of just going to South Bend to see Joe. By Sunday, when I hadn't heard anything from Navy Joe, I decided that I wanted to take that chance, and I told Joe that I wanted to come to South Bend to meet him. We talked a lot over the next week, and eventually Joe got me a plane ticket to visit him during his last weekend in South Bend.
The 24 days (yes, I counted) I had to wait between the day my ticket was purchased and the day we met seemed like so long, but they were well worth the wait. We planned for me to fly into South Bend the night of July 21st, and Joe and I would meet at the Grotto on campus on the 22nd after he got back from his motorcycle trip that morning.
In the days leading up to my trip, people kept asking me if I was nervous. I told them I wasn't nervous at all, just excited. Well, about five minutes before I met Joe, I got nervous. When I finally saw him, it felt like I was seeing an old friend. After spending a day or two figuring out that we got along just as well, if not better, in person as we did over the phone, things just clicked. We decided that weekend to pursue a relationship, though at this point we're both still getting used to the idea. It's going to be a bumpy road, but only time will tell where this goes.
