Meeting the girl

This is the first chapter I wrote in this book. I wanted to start with this moment because it changed everything.

I walked into a surf shop in San Juan, Puerto Rico. I was hungover, felt like garbage, reeked of alcohol, and looked exactly how you would imagine someone on a multi-day bender would look. As my eyes adjusted from the bright Caribbean sun, someone greeted me in Spanish.

"I'm sorry, I don't speak Spanish."

"Welcome. Let me know if I can help you find anything."

I looked up and saw a beautiful Puerto Rican girl standing shyly with the most adorable smile. It is hard to describe the feeling I had at that moment. Time stopped, sound faded, the air was sucked out of the room, and the whole world disappeared around me.

I tried to play it cool, mumbled something back to her, and awkwardly meandered around the surf shop. I pretended to browse the surf gear, but couldn't stop glancing at her. She looked familiar, and I wanted to talk to her. I made 3-4 approaches and waved them all off in a panic on short final.

I'm embarrassed to admit this, but I had recently read "The Game - penetrating the secret society of pick-up artists." by Neil Strauss. I assure you that if picking up girls was an art, my preferred medium would have been finger painting, spilling paint everywhere, and ruining my clothes. This book, at least gave me some courage, and I developed a plan.

There were several large locked display cases of sunglasses in the front of the store. I harnessed my inner pick-up artist and strutted to the sunglass case, and stood panicked while trying to look as cool as possible.

"Would you like to see some sunglasses?"

I nodded and uttered, "Yes, please."

My plan was coming together.

 Over the next half hour, I tried on nearly every pair of sunglasses in the case. In between each pair, I attempted small talk. I asked her about surfing, sought her opinion on at lease 60 pairs of sunglasses, and told stupid stories about the parking tickets I earned in San Juan. I tried to make her laugh because I couldn't stop admiring her smile. I talked to her about everything, except the one thing I wanted more than anything….to ask her out. After boreassing her time for a quarter of her workday, I decided it was only fair to settle on a pair of sunglasses, hoping she would receive a small commission.

She brought the glasses, which I didn't need nor intend on wearing, to the counter, and I remembered an important principle in "The Game" - time gapping. This is when, for some unknown reason, you give the person you're attempting to pick up some space. I think the theory was you would leave them wanting more interaction, and this somehow improved your chances of success. I told her I wanted to keep shopping, and I hit the flip-flop rack for no reason, despite having awkwardly fumbled around with the same flip-flops 30 minutes earlier. I was becoming a proper pick-up artist. I'm not sure about post-time-gapping success statistics, but it gave me a moment to devise a plan.

At the time, I lived in Isabela, Puerto Rico, on the West side of the island. It was a short 2-hour drive from San Juan on the most treacherous confusing highway in the world. The West side of Puerto Rico is home to several world-class surf spots, and I was right in the middle. I lived in a beach bungalow, and the downstairs was a vacation rental always packed with surfers.

After "time gapping", I strutted to the checkout counter to pay for the sunglasses. I casually mentioned the surf rental and used it as an excuse to exchange phone numbers. I was almost there, I just needed to ask her out!

I failed.

I was too scared and walked out of that surf shop with my tail between my legs. Defeated. I drove off in my Jeep telling myself, "At least I got some new sunglasses." I was disappointed in myself. Some pick-up artist I was. I began driving home. I missed my friend. I felt stupid for wasting money on the pick-up artist book and now on sunglasses!

Then it hit me again, a strange feeling of the world telling me I had to do something. I had her number, and wasn't ready to give up yet. I wasn’t ready to spend the rest of my life wondering about the girl in the surf shop. I pulled over.

Time stopped again. I waited desperately, hoping for an answer, hoping my fear didn't stop me from ever seeing this girl again, hoping she didn't give me a fake number, and hoping that walking out of that surf shop wasn't the worst mistake of my life. After a painfully long 5 minutes of staring at my phone and envisioning everything that could possibly go wrong…

Ok. At least she didn't give me a fake number. Her response was factual, but didn't answer the question. The stress continued as I stared at the phone and hoped for clarification. After what seemed like another eternity, I crafted the perfect response.

I may not have been a pick-up artist yet, but I was crushing it with my text message game. Surprisingly, she didn't answer right away. Maybe she was familiar with time-gapping and was using it against me? After another excruciating 5 minutes…

That's it?!?! I'm still illegally parked on the side of the road in San Juan trying to figure out what to do in this scenario. "The Game" did not cover text message interaction, and I felt ill-prepared. Was she interested? Was there a language barrier? Do I reply right away? How long should I wait? I didn't want to seem desperate and ruin it. I waited for what I thought was the proper amount of time to avoid looking like a stalker and sent this…

Just answer! I couldn't take much more stress. I think this was the longest she made me wait.

Another question?! Was this a test? I would literally go anywhere just to see her smile again, but I had to play it cool.

I couldn't believe it! I was given a second chance, and I was excited. I celebrated in the car and rushed to a pharmacy to grab deodorant, breath mints, and some water, hoping I could kick my hangover and look like a presentable gentleman for my big date!

A few minutes later, I arrived at the surf shop and picked her up. At this time, I was still unclear about her name. When I asked earlier, she said it with an abundance of Latin flair.

"Nah-Tea"

"Naughty?" (That can't be right)

"Naww-Teee"

Certainly, nobody would name their child naughty. I pretended to understand and moved on. "Ohhh, got it. Naughty."

Anyhow, I picked up "Naughty" and asked her where she wanted to eat. She said she was a vegetarian, and luckily, since I had stopped eating meat, I knew a vegetarian spot nearby. I don't remember what we talked about at lunch. Despite the emotional roller coaster I went through to be on that date, I remember having fun, laughing, and feeling totally comfortable with her. Towards the end of lunch, her boss called, and she excused herself to take the call. I feared the worst. I was convinced she was going to pull the "work is calling, and I need to get back right away" maneuver. I prepared myself. To my surprise, her boss had called to say that it was slow at the store, and she could have the rest of the day off. Inside, I was ecstatic, but on the outside, I played it cool like the pick-up artist I was. As we were finishing lunch, I told her I had no plans for the day and could take her back to work, or we could keep hanging out. We decided to immediately go on our second date.

It started raining, and "Naughty" wanted to see "Easy A," starring Emma Stone, a high school romcom and modern interpretation of "The Scarlet Letter." We drove to "Plaza las Americas," got tickets for the next show, and settled into our seats. We were a few minutes early, and as we sat there, we made our relationship official by following each other on the socials. Luckily, this clarified a few things. First, I finally realized that her name was Natalie, and she went by "Natty" because she thought it sounded edgy. Second, I finally realized why she looked familiar. Her socials were full of pictures of her surfing, and I realized that I had seen her at the beach weeks before. I nearly drowned a few times, being hit by waves, mouth open, sitting on my board as I watched Natalie surf. She was a phenomenal surfer and a joy to watch. I remember telling all my friends that I fell in love with a surfer girl at the beach that day. I couldn't believe I was sitting beside her in a theatre on our second date!

We sat through one hour and thirty-two minutes of high school rom-com bliss, and our second date was over just like that. As we left the theatre, I asked her again if she wanted me to take her back or keep hanging out. I told her I knew an Italian place in Old San Juan with authentic Italian food and the best mojitos I'd ever had. Soon after, we were walking through the charming Old San Juan streets on our way to our third date. It seemed like a fairy tale, and I already felt like the luckiest man alive. We ate some Italian food and drank too many mojitos. We stumbled around San Juan, danced, laughed, and had the time of our lives.

I was in no condition to drive, so I booked a nearby hotel, and we stayed together. In the coming weeks, I would spend every minute I could with Natalie, driving back and forth to San Juan just to spend a few hours with her. A few weeks later, I asked her to move in with me, and we have been together ever since.

We didn't realize that we needed to find each other because we were both about to go through some of the most challenging, traumatic years of our lives. Our relationship would quickly be galvanized by the pain of loss.

Post-flight debrief:

Natalie tells a different version of this story. If you ask her, she usually goes on a tirade about how she wanted nothing to do with me because I had a cut on my foot. A few days before I met her, I had nicked the top of my foot on my fin while surfing and had a large gash. I did no first aid, so the cut didn't look healthy, but that wasn't the issue. At some point during the marathon sunglass tour, she noticed the cut, and I told her it was a surfing injury. That apparently set off alarm bells, and according to Natalie, "nobody that actually knows how to surf would cut the top of their foot while surfing." To this day, I am not sure what kind of CSI wound analysis she used to determine this, but being a kook, or someone that couldn't surf, was an immediate deal breaker for Natalie.

Natalie also recounts that I wasn't "her type ." She loved scrawny, long-haired, soft-looking, emo, Chris Angel, eye makeup-wearing, My Chemical Romance listening type. As a bald man whose most recognizable feature is a permanent mean mug, there wasn't an immediate attraction. Despite my charm and the various techniques I learned in my book, I didn't stand a chance.

Natalie had recently escaped a two-and-a-half-year relationship with a physically and emotionally abusive partner. She had been single for a couple of months and swore she would be for a while to recover from everything she endured. When I texted Natalie, she showed it to her coworkers. Knowing what she had been through, they urged her to say yes and go out with me because I seemed nice. So as I sat in a panic waiting for her to text me back, she was arguing with them about why she couldn't possibly go out with "some gringo” because of the whole cut foot kook situation. Eventually, she relented and texted me back.

The ultimate Puerto Rico vehicle is a Jeep Wrangler. The moon has fewer craters than the Puerto Rican highway system, it's always warm enough to have the top down, and many of the best surf spots require off-road capabilities. In Puerto Rico, it is not uncommon to see traffic backed up for miles because proud jeep owners will drive 20 mph under the speed limit in impromptu parades to showcase their lifted steeds. Natalie had always wanted a Jeep Wrangler. It was her dream car.

I had no idea as I pulled up in my lifted Jeep Wrangler, the ultimate surf safari vehicle, Natalie would take it as a sign from the universe to give me a chance. That second chance got me to lunch, and after talking her ear off, she believed I was harmless and kind. A kind man was all she wanted at that point in her life. After lunch, our stories of that day corroborated, and we often reminisce about our first moments together.

Despite how different our stories are, we both agree that it couldn't have been luck. I'm not religious, and I'm not sure I could explain what I believe in, but meeting Natalie makes me think there is more to life than luck and coincidence. To this day, I can't explain how I ended up in the surf shop. I had just dropped my friend off at the airport, was trying to take a shortcut, spotted the surf shop, and something told me I should go in there. Natalie had been promoted the week before to a data entry position and no longer worked in the front of the store. That day, someone called out, and she reluctantly filled in at the front of the store. She assumed her up-front position mere minutes before I stumbled in with my cut foot. Those are just a few of the final things that had to go right to put us in each other's paths. This plan had to have been put into motion years before. I almost didn't make it into the Coast Guard Academy, should have never made it to flight school, and barely made it through, was selected for helicopters, got orders to Puerto Rico, and happened to drop my friend off at the airport that morning. Before walking into that surf shop, every moment in my life had to go exactly as it did, or we would have never happened. I can't accept that it's just luck.

This may all sound like a fairytale, but our relationship is not perfect, and I am not the perfect husband. I have made countless mistakes, fallen short many times, said things I never should have said, and hurt Natalie's feelings on occasion. I come from a long line of dysfunctional relationships, and I had no idea what a healthy relationship was supposed to look like. I don't use that as an excuse, but marriage is a skill, and if you are not taught that skill, you will have some work to do to have a successful marriage. That work is constant, but if you are with the person you are supposed to be with, it's the best work there is.