Date #2 - Rice Water

First a little background:

For those of you who were curious about how Eric and I met in the first place... let me give a summary. Here's the version we plan on telling our children:

We originally met 1 & 1/2 years prior to the first date, at a wedding of mutual friends. Eric was the best man, I was a soloist and bridesmaid. Therefore we had "known" each other all that time. :)

The truth is we exchanged a couple of sentences at that wedding at the most. I definitely noticed Eric - and even inquired as to why he was single. But I was seeing someone else at the time... and Eric didn't seem the slightest bit interested when I did make an attempt to converse. (I believe my exact words were: "oh, that's so sad... you're sitting at the table eating your cake all by yourself".)

Anyway... fast forward a year and a half. Honestly, I never thought about him again after that wedding... until early December, 16 months later. I was talking to my friend who had been married and suddenly asked what had ever happened to "that guy" that was the best man at her wedding. She said he was still single... and hung out with them quite a bit. I asked her what was wrong with him... (you single girls no doubt understand my asking that... the decent looking, successful ones inevitably seem to have something wrong with them... or they're already taken). She didn't seem to think anything was wrong with him - that she knew of... to which I replied...

"Then how come he never called?!"
"Why would he call you? You live in Reno and up until a few months ago you weren't even available."

I finally managed to talk her into suggesting to him that he email me. (Too forward?) Hey... all I can say is it worked. :)

A couple weeks later, Eric did indeed email me. You can imagine the many hesitations along with the confusion that he must have had... emailing a girl he had barely even met almost a year and a half ago - who lived in Reno, Nevada - 2000 miles from him. But he did! We exchanged messages for a couple weeks leading to Christmas, and then I reeled him in. Here's how the emails went:

Me - "So what are you doing for Christmas?"
Eric - "Spending time with my family, then heading to Chicago to visit John and Janet (perfect!). What are your plans?"
Me - (dropping the bate) "My parents will be out here for Christmas, and then I'm heading back to Chicago with them for a week. Maybe we'll be there at the same time!"
Eric - "Maybe we could get together for dinner one night." (Fish hooked!!)
Me - "OK, that sounds good." (HUGE smile on my face but carefully choosing my words to sound cool, calm, and not too desperate. I think I even waited a day or so to respond.)

So there you have it. NOW. Date #2:

After the first date and much to my excitement, Eric decided to stay another night with John and Janet so we could go out again the next evening. This time he planned to head out to the suburbs and meet me at my parents. We headed to downtown LaGrange, got some coffee, and walked around a little bit. Since it was raining, we headed into a little Mexican place for something to eat. To keep the story short... I'll skip to the juicy details. At some point, the conversation lulled a little... and Eric reached over and took my hand. Right about then... three things came into my mind:

1) My hair must look horrible after being out in the rain.
2) Oh - my - gosh. I'm totally going to marry this guy.
3) I think I'm going to be sick.

Our waitress came over and chose that moment to tell us how cute we looked... and I think we were asked about dessert. I noticed something on the menu and couldn't help but ask... "what is rice water"? She asked if we'd like to try some - and Eric ordered me a glass. Basically - it tasted like it sounds... but it makes for a good title to the story right?

After that we headed out for some more walking in the light rain. If you ask Eric... I believe he will tell you that shortly after walking out of the restaurant, he took my hand and knew himself that we would get married someday. Soon after, we wound up under an awning somewhere... talking for what we later realized had been 3 hours. Towards the end of that three hours... the conversation went something like this (and for the record... Eric will tell you a slightly different version but trust me... he's wrong).

Eric - "I kind of feel like I just met my wife."
Me - "Yeah, you did."

I'm not sure we really said much more that night - because neither one of us could believe that we had said or felt what we had... It was overwhelming and terrifying to say the least...but I guess things worked out. :)

The next day was New Year's Eve... as luck would have it, neither of us had a date for the evening... so Eric decided to stick around for yet another night before heading back to Indiana. (Poor John and Janet. I should mention that Janet was about 11 months pregnant at the time, and kept asking John when his friend was going to be leaving!! Sorry girl... but I'm SO glad you tolerated the extra company for a little longer!!)

P.S. MORE friends have started blogs!!! Check out Amanda (we go way back to high school) and a nursing school friend, Michelle.