We flirted online until I pulled out all the stops. I wrote a multi-page email with 12 levels of footnotes culminating in a "put up or shut up" call to action, and then I put down my phone and decided I'd never hear from her again.

The next day, I got a reply with a phone number and 2 words. "Giddy Up."

I read it and laughed. I had to meet this girl.

---

It was laundry day for me. So when I showed up wearing my worst pair of grey pants with paint stains on the thighs and an oversized flannel my dad gave me, I assumed this would go poorly and end quickly.

Instead, we spent the afternoon trading stories in the coffee shop until we built enough of an appetite for meatballs. Then we walked around Brooklyn until the city grew quiet and the sky started fading from black to purple.

She was smarter than me or anyone else I'd ever dated. She was compassionate. Curious. She had great taste in music. In art. She loved to read. She loved dogs and had a pitbull in her apartment.

I tried to walk her home, but she said it was creepy, so she stayed ten steps ahead of me. I followed until I saw her go inside.

Within weeks, we were together every day. Until we weren't...

Registry